Book contents
- Molière in Context
- Molière in Context
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Figures
- Charts and Tables
- Contributors
- Acknowledgements
- Translations
- Abbreviations
- Biographical Preface
- Part I Socio-Political Context
- Part II Intellectual and Artistic Context
- Part III Theatrical Context (Paris)
- Part IV Theatrical Context (Court)
- Chapter 18 Colbert, Cultural Policy and the Propaganda of Spectacle
- Chapter 19 The Decors of Comedy-Ballet: From the ‘Songe de Vaux’ to the ‘Rêve de Versailles’
- Chapter 20 Court Performances and Their Audiences
- Chapter 21 Music
- Chapter 22 The Livrets of Molière’s Plays
- Part V Reception and Dissemination
- Part VI Afterlives
- Further Reading
- Index
Chapter 22 - The Livrets of Molière’s Plays
from Part IV - Theatrical Context (Court)
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 10 November 2022
- Molière in Context
- Molière in Context
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Figures
- Charts and Tables
- Contributors
- Acknowledgements
- Translations
- Abbreviations
- Biographical Preface
- Part I Socio-Political Context
- Part II Intellectual and Artistic Context
- Part III Theatrical Context (Paris)
- Part IV Theatrical Context (Court)
- Chapter 18 Colbert, Cultural Policy and the Propaganda of Spectacle
- Chapter 19 The Decors of Comedy-Ballet: From the ‘Songe de Vaux’ to the ‘Rêve de Versailles’
- Chapter 20 Court Performances and Their Audiences
- Chapter 21 Music
- Chapter 22 The Livrets of Molière’s Plays
- Part V Reception and Dissemination
- Part VI Afterlives
- Further Reading
- Index
Summary
Livrets were distributed to the spectators of all of Molière’s plays created at court and involving music, from Le Mariage forcé (1664) to La Comtesse d’Escarbagnas (1671). They explained the action, described the decors, costumes and dances, and gave the names of those dancing. This chapter explore three ways of reading these livrets. First, they are precious traces of the conditions in which the plays were created within court entertainments. Second, they constitute a specific branch of theatre publishing with its own aesthetics – involving a combination of different art forms and an accumulation of different pleasures – and its own audience, which is designated as an elite. Finally, because they contribute to the representation of monarchical power, they are a way of demonstrating a close relationship with this power and of recording it in the long-lived form of print. All this makes them an ideal site in which to observe the ways in which theatrical practices were institutionalised in the second half of the seventeenth century, and the central role Molière and his troupe played in this process.
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- Molière in Context , pp. 210 - 218Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2022