Molière

Biography

Molière (1622–1673), born Jean-Baptiste Poquelin, was a French playwright, actor, and theater director who is widely regarded as one of the greatest comic writers in Western literature. Born in Paris to a prosperous upholstery merchant, he abandoned a secure bourgeois career to pursue theater, founding the Illustre Théâtre in 1643. After years of touring the French provinces, Molière’s company won the patronage of Louis XIV in 1658, establishing itself at the Palais-Royal. Over the next fifteen years Molière produced a stream of comic masterpieces that combined physical comedy with devastating social satire: The School for Wives (1662), Tartuffe (1664), Don Juan (1665), The Misanthrope (1666), The Miser (1668), The Bourgeois Gentleman (1670), and The Imaginary Invalid (1673). His plays attacked hypocrisy, pretension, greed, and social climbing with such precision that they provoked bitter opposition from religious authorities and the medical profession. Tartuffe was banned for five years due to pressure from the Church. Molière died on stage (or shortly after performing) during a production of The Imaginary Invalid and was initially denied a Christian burial. His plays remain the most performed works in the French theater and have shaped comic drama worldwide.