Rivalry and the Disruption of Order in Molière's Theater

Download or read book Rivalry and the Disruption of Order in Molière's Theater written by Michael S. Koppisch and published by Fairleigh Dickinson Univ Press. This book was released on 2004 with total page 228 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In critical readings of ten of Moliere's most important plays, this book argues that a rivalry that endangers order by collapsing differences structures the works and provides a key to their understanding. Moliere's great comic characters all want desperately something that they cannot have. The objects of their desire may vary, but the presence of desire itself remains a constant. In L'Ecole des femmes. Amolphe wants, above all, to avoid cuckoldry. The title character in Dom Juan covets women. The bourgeois Monsieur Jourdain does all in his power to become a gentleman in Le Bourgeois gentilhomme, and the eponymous character in George Dandin views his woes as the price of an ill-fated marriage that he had hoped would elevate him to noble rank. Le malade imaginaire, Argan, has a seemingly crazy desire to be sick. The list could go on.