The Misanthrope and Tartuffe, by Molière

I rarely read plays (not counting Mr. S.) and rarely read poetry. I'm glad I broke with tradition and read these. I think I went to high school with some of the characters - and 45 years later some of them haven't changed. The plays are so funny that I found myself reading out loud (to myself) using different voices for the characters. I have never done that before and it added to my enjoyment to create a "play" while reading the script. Most enjoyable - maybe I'll tackle some more plays.

Many people are turned off by the rhyming nature of Tartuffe. Personally I find myself so enthralled with the story that I often fail to notice that the story itself rhymes. Real belly laughs abound as we watch Orgon blindly walk through life, oblivious to the religious-hypocrite's misdeeds. It's an absurd story, but it's meant to be thus. It does miss something if you don't see it performed live but once you have, when you read it as it is presented here, you manage to get full enjoyment! The Misanthrope exists in much the same credit. This work centers on the protagonist Alceste, whose wholesale rejection of his culture's polite social conventions make him tremendously unpopular. This manifests itself in the primary conflict of the play, which results from Alceste's refusal to compliment a sonnet by Oronte, a character who lacks Alceste's respect for unabashed sincerity. I'm not as big a fan of The Misanthrope as of Tartuffe but I thoroughly enjoyed this book and was very happy to be exposed to the text this way. This is an excellent rendering.

Here they are. The Misanthrope and Tartuffe, arguably Moliere's two most famous plays, translated by Pulizter Prize-winner Richard Wilbur, the crown jewels of his poetic output. These translations are performed all the time, and have proved themselves on the modern stage. But the effect of them is not lessened by reading, as this bookshelf-ready edition shows. They are packed with hilarious observations about the pretentions in us all.The Misanthrope is about a man who tells the harshest truth to everyone but himself; Tartuffe about hypocricy in religion. They read fast and funny, the rhyming couplets of the original faithfully reproduced. The language seems so natural and witty that you think perhaps these plays weren't written in the seventeenth century. But they were, this species of farce being extinct these days, except in rare places like The Simpsons. I can not only unhesitatingly recommend these, but also all of Wilbur's translations of Moliere. It is rare for a comic author to get such a seriously worthy treatment. Hooray!

In both these plays, Wilbur brings Moliere's true genius to real life. Previous translations of Moliere's work pale by comparison to Wilbur's brilliant translations. It was my feeling, that would Moliere by alive today, and writing in American English, he would write the way Wilbur translated it. In comparison to prose translations in the past, Wilbur, past US Poet Laureate and Pulitzer Prize winner, truly gives the reader the real feeling of Moliere's "Balletic Comedy" style, as Moliere used his poetry and comedy to make complex and serious points about life of "regular" people, as opposed to royalty such as Shakespeare concentrated on, and so many other playwrites of the past. In reading Wilbur's translations, one can virtually imagine the cast prancing and mincing across the stage as they humorously render these rhyming couplets at each other, and the audience. The true genius of both Moliere and Wilbur is illustrated most profoundly and strikingly in these translations. Any true lover of Moliere, and even those who have never read him before, should treat themselves to Wilbur's translations for a Moliere experience, that is unparalleled in any other versions previously published.

Wilbur's translation of this Moliere work is particularily well done, with excellent rhyme scheme even in English translation. Misanthrope is a excellent play, filled with ironic twists.