The dramatist, Jean Rotrou

Abstract

Previous studies of the work of Jean Rotrou hare often shown that a specific preconceived framework of interpretation - Classicism, for example - can successfully be applied to a limited number of his plays. This thesis, however, is intended to show that certain fundamental principles identify Rotrou’s entire dramatic output as a unified canon.

Such principles can only he discovered from the plays themselves, viewed primarily as effective pieces of drama. From a detailed analysis of the individual plays, three basic principles emerge: - the interweaving of folk motifs, creative exploitation of the visual medium and structural unity from the interplay of contrasts.

These three principles underlie all Rotrou’s drama, and point us towards an understanding of the artistic and philosophic precepts informing the canon. Rotrou ’ s dram embodies a different conception of Man and The Universe from that capable of being conveyed by the Classical ethos of Reason; he argues for moderation and humility; and his faith-oriented dram evokes an aura of primitive group ritual, Rotrou's seventeenth-century success and subsequent neglect may be explained by the fact that his drama represents one of the last protests of the mediæval spirit, unhampered by a surfeit of reasoning.

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