Characters he did not seek to draw, but he made a
personage the medium of incarnating a quality. Harpagon is not a
miser; he is Avarice speaking and doing. Alceste is not a person; he
is Misanthropy personified.
This fundamental exaggeration led to and facilitated the caricature of
relations and juxtapositions. With laughable unscrupulousness Moliere
multiplies improbable blunders and conjunctions. All verisimilitude is
sacrificed to scenic vivacity. Hence, the very highest of his comedies
are farce-like; even "Tartuffe" is so.
In Moliere little dramatic growth goes on before the
spectator's eye. His personages are not gradually built up by
successive touches, broad or fine; they do not evolve themselves
chiefly by collision with others; in the first act they come on the
stage unfolded. The action and plot advance rapidly, but not through
the unrolling of the persons represented. Hence, his most important
personages are prosaic and finite. They interest you more as agents
for the purpose in hand than as men and women. They are subordinate
rather to the action than creative of action.
Moliere is a most thorough realist, and herein is his strength.
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