Molière, original name Jean-Baptiste Poquelin, (baptized January 15, 1622, Paris, France—died February 17, 1673, Paris), French actor and playwright, the greatest of all writers of French farce, satire and comedy.
The sacred and secular authorities of 17th-century France often combined against him, in time with the backing of King Louis XIV the genius of Molière became apparent to win him approval and praise. Before Molière, comedy had a long history. Although he, and others, used most of its traditional forms, it was Molière who succeeded in inventing a new style that was based on point-counterpoint of normal and abnormal as seen in relation to each other—the comedy of the true opposed to the false, baseless, inaccurate, unfounded, fallacious, misleading, and simply untrue; while the intelligent was seen alongside and opposed to the finnicky, plodding, obscure, arcane, nitpicking, hair-splitting , fussy or simply dilettantish behavior.
An actor himself, Molière appears to take any situation and bring it to life and dramatize it, often unrestricted by the limits of likelihood. Molière lived in an age of reason, therefore he had the good sense not to evangelize or be preachy with a solution but rather to enliven the absurd, thereby allowing the audience to see the absurdity for themselves. As in such masterpieces as Tartuffe, L’École des femmes, Le Misanthrope, Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme, and many others. It is testimony to the freshness of his vision that the greatest comic artists working centuries later in other media, such as Charlie Chaplin have been compared to Molière.
Molière was born (and died) in the heart of Paris. His mother died when he was 10 years old; his father, one of the appointed furnishers of the royal household, gave him a good education at the Collège de Clermont (the school that, as the Lycée Louis-le-Grand, was to train so many brilliant Frenchmen, including Voltaire). Although his father clearly intended him to take over his royal appointment, the young man renounced it in 1643, apparently determined to break with tradition and seek a living on the stage. That year he joined with nine others to produce and play comedy as a company under the name of the Illustre-Théâtre. His stage name, Molière, is first found in a document dated June 28, 1644. He was to give himself entirely to the theatre for 30 years and to die exhausted at the age of 51.
Molière wrote comedies for the stage. He is the author of enduring plays such as Tartuffe and Le Misanthrope. Many of his plays contained scandalous material. They were met with public outcry and were suppressed by the Roman Catholic Church.
Molière created a new kind of comedy. In his plays, the comic is based on a double vision that holds together opposing ideas, such as wisdom and folly or right and wrong. He was controversial during his day, but he is now viewed as an icon of French culture.
From the end of 1645 for thirteen years no history of the Molière troupe’s whereabouts can be verified with any certain degree of accuracy. Suffice it to say that these years are vaguely traceable by virtue of municipal registers and church records which showed the company appearing here and there: in Nantes in 1648 and Toulouse in 1649. Later they were in Lyon on and off from the end of 1652 to the summer of 1655 and again in 1657. Another city was Montpellier in 1654 and 1655, and finally before returning to Paris at Béziers in 1656. They certainly had their ups and downs. These undocumented years were of crucial importance to Molière’s career. They were tantamount to serving a rigorous apprenticeship , forming as they did a rigorous apprenticeship for his later work as actor-manager. It taught him how to deal with staunch opposition including other authors, colleagues, audiences, and authorities. His rapid success was demonstrated through his perseverance against opposition when he returned to Paris. Clearly his success would be inexplicable without the many years of on-the-job training.
And so, upon his return to Paris and he began his play writing career with writing farcical plays: The plays he wrote L’Étourdi; ou, les contretemps (The Blunderer; or, The Mishaps), in 1655, and Le Dépit amoureux (The Amorous Quarrel), performed in 1656.
The real path to fame began for Molière on the afternoon of October 24, 1658. In the guardroom of the Louvre on an improvised stage, the company presented Corneille’s Nicomède before King Louis XIV. This performance was dull and not received well by the king. Perhaps a luke-warm reception would be more apropos. Molière sensed this and implored the king to allow him to perform a short, but entertaining play which had been well received by provincial audiences. The king granted his permission and Molière performed Le Docteur amoureux (“The Amorous Doctor”). It was a success and secured the favour of the king’s brother Philippe duc d’Orléans. It is difficult to know the extent of Philippe’s patronage, lasting seven years, until the king took over Molière’s Illustre-Théâtre the company which became known as “Troupe du roi.” There is no doubt the company gained great prestige and celebrity, replete with invitations to great houses, venues, and subsidies.