Molière authorship question

The Molière authorship question is a controversy started in 1919 when Pierre Louÿs, in two articles entitled "Corneille est-il l'auteur d'Amphitryon ?" ("Is Corneille the author of Amphitryon?") [1] et “L'Imposteur de Corneille et le Tartuffe de Molière" ("The impostor of Corneille and the Tartuffe of Molière" ) [2], claimed that he had uncovered a literary hoax. According to Louys, Molière should have not written his own plays due to the exceptional proximity with Pierre Corneille 's verses but should have used him as a ghostwriter.

More recently, the rediscovery of so-called comedians poets in the 17th century who were prominent and wealthy and presented the plays at the time as if they were the authors - it is estimated that 9 comedies out of 10 were in this case-, re-launched the questioning on the singularity of comedian and writer Molière[3][4] There was in fact no copyright legislation at all in France in the 17th century, it was created in the 18th century with the Society of Authors.

Molière was barely seen as a writer by his contemporaries:

« ses enfants ont plus d’un père » «le Parnasse s’assemble, lorsqu’il veut faire quelque chose»(Donneau de Visé, 1663)

"his children have more than one father »« the Parnassus assembles, when he wants to do something»(Donneau de Visé, 1663) [5].

« Molière n’est pas une source vive mais un bassin qui reçoit ses eaux d’ailleurs », il est comme ces « ânes seulement capables de porter de grands fardeaux » (Robinet, 1663)

« Molière is not a living source but a basin that receives its waters from elsewhere ", it is like these" donkeys only able to bear great burdens » (Robinet, 1663) [6].

« A M. de Molière

Rare et fameux esprit, dont la fertile veine Ignore en écrivant le travail et la peine ; Pour qui tient Apollon tous ses trésors ouverts, Et qui sais à quel coin se marquent les bons vers : Dans les combats d’esprit savant maître d’escrime, Enseigne-moi, Molière, où tu trouves la rime. On dirait quand tu veux, qu’elle te vient chercher : Jamais au bout du vers on ne te voit broncher ; Et, sans qu’un long détour t’arrête ou t’embarrasse, A peine as-tu parlé, qu’elle-même s’y place.»

« To Mr Molière

Rare and famous spirit, whose fertile vein Ignores while writing the work and the pain; For whom Apollo holds all his treasures open, And who know where the good verses are marked : In spiritual fights expert fencing master, Teach me, Molière, where you find rhyme. It seems as if you want, that it comes to you : Never at the end of the verse do you see yourself flinch; And, without a long detour stopping or embarrassing you, Hardly have you spoken, that she places herself there» [7].

Molière in fact never presented himself as a writer and was not considered like this by his contemporaries. He was buried as a comedian and troop director, not an author (Molière) .

The collaboration of Moliere and Corneille is at least firmly established for Psyche (1671), due to the added foreword by the editor (Psyché (play)) .

This controversy , which attracted interest from time to time through the 20th century after the sensation made by Louÿs, has been renewed at the beginning of the 2000s, notably with the publication in a scientific journal of two articles attempting to use stylometric analysis to show the closeness of vocabulary and syntax between Corneille and Molière.[8] [9].

This controversy has even been strengthened by study of strong coincidence in the lifes of Corneille and Molière which may suggest that there should have been indeed a collaboration for more than a decade between the master of the writing and the actor and director. [10].

As in the case of Shakespeare, this theory is rejected by conservatism and for lack of evidence by experts on Corneille[11] and Molière,[12] as well as historians of literature and French drama generally, who do not mention it.[13]

References
  1. Published in la revue L'Intermédiaire des chercheurs et curieux, August 1919.
  2. Published in la revue Comœdia, le 7 november 1919, Gallica. https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k76533058/f1.item
  3. See list of comedian poets Principals sources : database on line CESAR (Calendrier Electronique des Spectacles sous l’Ancien Régime et la révolution) ; Mongrédien 1961 ; Mongrédien, Jean 1981.
  4. Les "comédiens-poètes" en France au XVIIe siècle / Shikiko Nishida ; sous la direction de Georges Forestier Mémoire de thèse
  5. La Vengeance des marquis, ou Réponse à L'Impromptu de Versailles, comédie en prose, Loyson 1664, p15
  6. Panégyrique de l'École des Femmes, ou la Conversation comique sur les œuvres de M. de Molière, comédie en prose, en un acte, Paris, Charles de Sercy, 1664. Voir également Œuvres complètes de Molière: La Critique de L'École des femmes. L'Impromptu de Versailles. Remerciement au roi. Le Mariage forcé. Fêtes de Versailles : Les Plaisirs de l'Ile enchantée. La Princesse d'Élide. Don Juan ou le Festin de Pierre. L'Amour médecin, tome 3, édition présentée et annotée par Louis Moland, Garnier, 1863, p. 123, note 1.
  7. Satire II Boileau (1665)
  8. Dominique et Cyril Labbé, « Inter-Textual Distance and Authorship Attribution : Corneille and Molière », Journal of Quantitative Linguistics, vol. 8, n° 3, 2001, p. 213-231.
  9. Mathematical Methods for Attributing Literary Works when Solving the “Corneille–Molière” Problem, Mikhail Marusenko, Elena Rodionova, Journal of Quantitative Linguistics 17(1):30-54 · February 2010
  10. H Wouters, C de Ville de Goyet Molière ou l'auteur imaginaire, Edition complexe, 1990; Si deux et deux sont quatre, Molière n’a pas écrit Dom Juan / Dominique Labbé. Paris : Max Milo, oct. 2009, 260 p. ISBN 978-2-35341-073-6; see also the site http://corneilleavecmoliere.net/Corneille_avec_Moliere/Moliere_et_Cie.html and the video "l'ombre d un doute Molière" on YouTube
  11. See for example the conclusion of André Le Gall in the most recent biography of Corneille (Flammarion, 1997): "Il n'est pas inconcevable que Molière ait confié ses manuscrits à Corneille afin qu'il y jette un œil. […] Cette hypothèse-là, purement hypothétique, mais conforme à la nature des liens qui peuvent se tisser entre un auteur et son metteur en scène, n'ôte en rien à Molière la paternité de ses œuvres" "It is not inconceivable that Moliere had presented his manuscripts to Corneille so that he can throw an eye. [...] This assumption, purely hypothetical, but in conformity with the nature of the links that can exist between an author and its director, but it does not remove the authorship of his works to Moliere" (p.473); see also, as of 2011, the objection published by the community of Corneille scholars: http://www.corneille.org/index.php?lng=fr
  12. See for example the conclusion of Roger Duchêne in the most recent biography of Molière (Fayard, 1998); see also, as of 2011, the site "Molière auteur des œuvres de Molière" Archived 2012-01-14 at the Wayback Machine created by the editors of the new edition of Molière's Œuvres complètes in the Bibliothèque de la Pléiade, published in 2010.
  13. See the most recent history of French drama: Charles Mazouer, Le Théâtre français de l'âge classique, Paris, Champion, 2 vol. (2006 et 2010).
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