"Tartuffe" and "Phaedra"

Comparison Essay # 107458

Drama and Theater > World
English > Comparison
Literature > French

A comparison of the portrayal of the theme of lust in Moliere's play, "Tartuffe" and Jean Racine's play, "Phaedra."

1,112 words () | 0 sources | 2008 United States

Paper Summary:

This paper compares and contrasts Moliere's play, "Tartuffe" and Jean Racine's play, "Phaedra." It specifically compares the theme of lust that can be found in both stories and shows how they are presented in different forms. Specifically, the paper discusses the characters displaying the lust, the way in which surrounding characters react to that display and why the authors chose to use the methods he did to form the overall theme.

From the Paper:

"Racine shows Phaedra in more sympathetic manner because he is not focused on singling out a type of person, but rather, an idea. Racine's intent is to shed light on the limitations of rationality over passion and lust. He wants to show Phaedra as human and as someone more identifiable with. By doing this, Racine better displays his idea. The futility of rationality over passion is in all of us. It is a human universal and thus can not be changed. Moliere is more focused on showing the hypocrisy in certain types of behavior. He takes every opportunity to show what type of behavior it is that he wants our attention drawn to. From the beginning of the play until the end, Moliere has his characters say things like "Shall you conclude that all men are deceivers, and that, today, there are no true believers? Let atheists make that foolish inference; learn to distinguish virtue from pretense" (Act V sc. 2, 1. 46-50) in order to let us see how he wants us to change. He wants us to see these types of behavior in our everyday lives. By making us dislike Tartuffe, Moliere makes the reader more likely to see the hypocrisy. The dislike will leave a more lasting impression and effect how much we notice hypocrites outside of the story as well as inside of it. By invoking more obvious emotions, Moliere's story is more likely to inspire us to affect the outside world either by changing our own actions or understanding other people's actions."