The creative activity of Moliere, the greatest comedian of modern times, is closely connected with classicism, the leading trend in French literature of the 17th century.

According to the requirements of classicism, Moliere's comedies, as a "low" genre, depict the life of ordinary townspeople in a comic way. He knows how to focus the action around one main conflict, make it concentrated and dynamic. The composition of Moliere's comedies is distinguished by strict consistency, internal harmony and symmetry. Molière's comedies are not rich in external events, the main attention is focused on the dialogue, which reveals the relationship of the characters and their characters. The characters of Molière's comedies are either a generalized expression of some moral and psychological quality (stinginess, hypocrisy, misanthropy, etc.), or the embodiment of some ridiculous weakness that turns into a mania that determines the entire behavior of the hero (bourgeois Jourdain in the comedy " A tradesman in the nobility" definitely wants to get a noble title, Argan, the hero of the comedy "The Imaginary Sick", is obsessed with his illnesses).

Sometimes the laws of classicism limited Moliere's desire for a truthful depiction of reality and came into conflict with his democratic views. Throughout his creative activity, Molière remained faithful to farcical traditions ("Tartuffe"), which sharply provoked condemnation from Boileau, who considered farcical laughter rude and obscene. Molière freely handles the rule of "three unities" (in the comedies "Don Giovanni", "The Doctor involuntarily" the rule of the unity of the place of action is violated). Contrary to the laws of classicism, Molière comically depicts the nobles and introduces pictures of village life, while the theorists of classicism excluded the village from the sphere of art. All these deviations from the laws of classicism did not violate the artistic merits of his comedies, but, on the contrary, contributed to a more complete depiction of life and the creation of a lively comic action.

One of Molière's best comedies, dedicated to criticism of the bourgeoisie, is The Tradesman in the Nobility. In form, it belongs to the genre of comedy-ballet, since dance numbers are introduced into the comedy, which are closely related to the action.

Moliere ridicules the bourgeoisie, who sought to get closer to the nobility and acquire an aristocratic title, manners and lifestyle of the nobles. The wealthy tradesman Jourdain was obsessed with titles of nobility and secular manners. To do this, he wants to learn aristocratic manners and learn those arts and sciences that are necessary for a nobleman. He generously pays teachers, they willingly serve him, although they internally laugh at him. Jourdain's training scenes are very funny. The author uses both methods of farcical laughter (teachers quarrel, be rude to each other, start fights), and more subtle humor, which is directed both against Jourdain's ignorance, and against that aristocratic art and formalistic science that are presented to him.

Jourdain is not only ridiculous, but also socially harmful. He deceives his wife, destroys his daughter's happiness, forbids her to marry a man of non-noble origin.

Moliere reveals the complete failure of the aristocracy. Count Dorant is a ruined aristocrat, a man without conscience and honor. Jourdain bows down to people who don't deserve it. But Jourdain is not only funny. When the stupid mania unites with the selfishness of the tyrant-bourgeois, it becomes dangerous for other people.

Lucille and Cleont act in comedy as carriers of natural human feelings, free from any prejudice, calculation and vanity. But their love meets an obstacle. Jourdain sacrifices his daughter's happiness to his selfishness.

The culmination of the comedy is considered to be the ceremony of Jourdain's initiation into "mamamushi", since Jourdain's mania reaches its highest point in this scene and all the absurdity, ugliness of his behavior is exposed here in a particularly vivid form.

Disguised as a Turkish sultan, Cleonte receives Lucille's hand. Jourdain, blessed with the title of "mamamushi", does not suspect that he has been passed over.

Molière criticizes not only the noble mania of Jourdain, but also those traits of his character that arose on the basis of bourgeois practice. He becomes rude, selfish, wayward.

The comedy "The Philistine in the Nobility" is sustained mainly in the spirit of the requirements of classicism. It follows the rules of the three unities. The action takes place within the same room - in the house of the bourgeois Jourdain - and does not go beyond one day. The unity of action is expressed in the fact that all events are subject to the disclosure of the character of one central character - Jourdain.

Without overloading the comedy with events, the author reveals the characters' characters and their relationships by means of dialogue, uses various forms of creating a comic effect: subtle intellectual humor with which his dialogues are saturated, the comedy of external situations borrowed from the farcical tradition (scenes of teachers' quarrel, dressing up Jourdain, Covel and Cleont , the ceremony of initiation of Jourdain into “mamamushi”, accompanied by stick blows), comic scenes based on misunderstandings and mutual misunderstanding (the scene of a quarrel between two couples in love, a masquerade scene, during which the characters do not recognize each other and fall into a ridiculous position). Molière creates a cheerful live spectacle. Molière subordinates all forms of laughter to the fulfillment of one common task: the disclosure of a comedic conflict that has a deep social meaning.

According to the rules of classicism, comedy has five acts. Her composition is distinguished by harmony and inner harmony. The language of comedy approaches the spoken language. Deviations from the rules of classicism in this comedy were expressed in the comic display of the nobles and in the use of forms of farcical laughter.

Jean Baptiste Moliere was the creator of the comedy of classicism. The influence of Moliere was experienced by all the major comedians of the 18th century. not only in France, but also in other countries.

But also many undertakings in the field of art. Back in the 17th century, the son of the court upholsterer Jean-Baptiste Poquelin, better known to the whole world under the name of Moliere, composed a witty, brilliant comedy, combining two such different genres as a dramatic theatrical performance and ballet into one. And now, for the fourth century, it has not left the stages of metropolitan and provincial theaters, it has been studied in schools, and the heroes of the work have long since become household names.

Genre Discovery

Of course, we are talking about Moliere's great comedy "The tradesman in the nobility." Everything was new in the work: a pronounced mockery of the morals and habits of high society, and a realistic depiction of ignorant rudeness, ignorance, greed and stupidity of the bourgeoisie, stubbornly striving to share power and privileges in a country with an impoverished nobility, and the author’s obvious sympathy for a simple person, representative of the so-called third estate. This is with regard to the problems and A spectacle of the production, colorful costumes, musical numbers ... Louis XIV, an ardent admirer of music, dance, especially ballet, loved a variety of enchanting performances. But before Molière, playwrights were not able to combine stage action, dance numbers and ballet so skillfully. In this regard, "The Philistine in the Nobility" may well be considered the forerunner of the modern musical. Comedy-ballet - such is the original genre of the work of the great Moliere.

The history of the creation of comedy

The event that brought comedy to life is also not quite ordinary. When in 1669 the Sun King, as Louis was nicknamed for his passion for clothes, jewelry, external chic and brilliance, it became known that the Sultan of the Great Ottoman Empire (i.e. Turkey) was sending an embassy delegation to him, the ruler of France decided to surpass him in pieces of luxury. The sparkle of jewels, the abundance of gold and silver, expensive materials, luxury items should have overshadowed the eyes of ambassadors accustomed to such abundance in the East, and spread the glory of the wealth and grandeur of the French court and its ruler throughout the world. But the plan of the king failed: he became a victim of mystification and deceit. Enraged, Ludovic commissioned Molière to write a comedy that would make fun of the Turkish mentality along with their delegation. Thus was born the "Philistine in the nobility", the first presentation of which before the king and nobility was given in mid-October 1670, and the official one, for the Parisian public, in November 1670. From that very day (November 28) on the stage of the main theater of Paris - the Palais Royal - during the life of the author, the performance was staged more than 42 times, and this is not counting other productions in smaller theaters! And about a century later, the first professional translation of the comedy into Russian appeared. In Russia, "The Philistine in the Nobility" was accepted with a bang, and his victorious procession continues to this day.

The plot of the work is simple, the main intrigue of the comedy lies not in the conflict, but in the characters. Jourdain, a bourgeois of respectable age, very rich, but narrow-minded, rude, and sometimes frankly stupid, ignorant, wants with all his might to join the noble sophistication, grace, gallantry and outward brilliance. The ultimate goal of all his tricks is the Marquise Dorimena, a cutesy aristocrat, accustomed to judging people by the severity of their wallet and the loudness of the title. The ruined Count Dorant, a trickster and a deceiver, safely leads Jourdain by the nose, promising to help get closer to Dorimena and, in general, to introduce his “friend” into the high Parisian society. By nature, he is far from a fool, Mr. Jourdain is blinded by the brilliance of the nobility and does not notice point-blank that he has long been a "cash cow" for such rogue aristocrats. He borrows huge sums of money from them without demanding a return. He hires a whole host of teachers, tailors, so that they educate and hew it a little. There is no sense in this, but gold coins are flowing away like a full-flowing river. In fact, “The Philistine in the Nobility”, the summary of which is to ridicule and criticize the ruling class of the nobles and the bourgeoisie that comes to replace it, is a wonderful parody of the monarchical absolutist system that developed in France at the end of the 17th century. The comedy clearly emphasized that the future was not for jourdains and dorants, but for such honest, active, enterprising and viable types and characters, like Cleont, the groom of Jourdain's daughter, Covelier, his servant, and all those who are used to achieving everything in life thanks to his own mind and strength. In this regard, the book "The Philistine in the Nobility" could become a desktop book for the Russian nobility. However, the comedy of the remarkable Russian playwright Fonvizin "Undergrowth" turned out to be close to the point of view and the author's characteristics of Molière. Both of them are included in the golden fund of world literature.

Common noun of images

Needless to say, many comedy expressions have become aphorisms, and its main character symbolizes human rudeness and ignorance, lack of taste and sense of proportion! “Jourdain with papillots” - we are talking about this, and that says it all!

The comedy "The Philistine in the Nobility" is one of the most famous works of French literature. Like many other works by Molière, this play makes fun of human stupidity and vanity. Despite the lightness and abundance of farce, the author's satirical attitude towards the main character and the situation in which he found himself puts the work "The Tradesman in the Nobility" on one of the highest levels of literature with social overtones.

The article considers the history of the creation of the play, its analysis and a brief retelling. "The Tradesman in the Nobility" consists of five acts with a different number of scenes in each. Below is a summary of each of them.

Molière

Molière is the pseudonym of the author, his real name is Jean Baptiste Poquelin. One of the pillars of French literature, Moliere wrote comedies that are considered the best in the history of not only French, but European literature in general.

Despite their enormous popularity at court, Molière's works were often criticized by hardline moralists and adherents of the Catholic Church. However, criticism did not prevent the author from ridiculing the vanity and duplicity of both the former and the latter. Oddly enough, the theater of Jean-Baptiste Molière was very popular. Many critics attribute to Moliere the important role of the court jester - the only person in the king's court who was allowed to tell the truth.

Literature and theater in the time of Molière

Molière began writing plays at a time when literature was strictly divided into classical and realistic. The theater belonged to classical literature, where tragedy was a high genre and comedy a low one. According to such rules, it was supposed to write to Moliere, but the author more than once violated the canons of genres and mixed classicism with realism, comedy with tragedy and farce with harsh social criticism in his comedies.

In some ways, his gift as a writer was far ahead of his time. It is safe to say that the father of modern comedy is Jean-Baptiste Molière. The plays written by him and the performances under his direction brought the theater to a new level.

The history of the creation of the play

In 1670, King Louis XIV commissioned Molière a Turkish farce, a play that would make fun of the Turks and their traditions. The fact is that the Turkish delegation that came the previous year greatly hurt the pride of the conceited autocrat, declaring that the Sultan's horse was richer decorated.

Louis was extremely offended by this attitude, did not improve the mood of the king and the fact that the Turkish embassy turned out to be fake and had nothing to do with the Sultan. The comedy "The Philistine in the Nobility" was created in 10 days and was almost completely improvised. In his work, Moliere slightly went beyond the scope of the order, creating a Turkish farce with the aim of ridiculing not the Turks, but the French, or rather, the collective image of a wealthy bourgeois striving to become an aristocrat.

The farce in this comedy is not only Turkish, as the summary below confirms. "The tradesman in the nobility" from the very first lines immerses the reader or viewer into a performance within a performance, where the main character turns his whole life into a farce.

Brief retelling of the plot

The play takes place almost entirely in the home of a wealthy merchant named Jourdain. His father made a fortune in the textile trade, and Jourdain followed in his footsteps. However, in his later years, he came up with the crazy idea to become an aristocrat. He directs all his merchant's assertiveness to indiscriminately imitate representatives of the upper class. His attempts are so ridiculous that they are the subject of ridicule not only of his wife and maid, but of all the people around him.

Congenital vanity and the desire to quickly become an aristocrat makes a blind fool out of the bourgeois, at whose expense dance teachers, music, fencing and philosophy are fed, as well as a host of tailors and Jourdain's patron - a certain Count Dorant. In his desire for the upper class, Jourdain does not allow his daughter to marry her beloved young bourgeois named Cleont, which forces the young man to deceive and start the very Turkish farce.

In five acts of the comedy, the viewer watches how an enterprising and prudent merchant becomes obsessed with the idea of ​​becoming something other than who he really is. His stupid behavior describes the summary. "The Tradesman in the Nobility" is a play consisting of five actions unequal in time. What happens in them is described below.

The structure of the play and the original performance

Today, "The Tradesman in the Nobility" is one of the most popular comedies and is staged in theaters around the world. Many directors venture into reworked and revised productions. Few people put this comedy in exactly the form in which it was conceived by Molière. Modern productions shorten not only the ballet, but also the musical and poetic scenes, making the comedy more like a summary. "The bourgeois in the nobility" in the original production of Molière looks really like a farce in the medieval sense of the word.

The fact is that the original production is a comedy-ballet, where dance plays a special role in a satirical attitude towards the protagonist. Of course, the main value of the comedy is not lost if the ballet scenes are omitted, but the original performance can take the viewer to the theater of the 17th century. An important role is also played by the music written by Jean-Baptiste Lully, whom Moliere himself called his co-author. "The Tradesman in the Nobility" uses music and dance as literary devices necessary to reveal the characters.

Plot and synopsis. "The tradesman in the nobility" by actions

Comedy consists of a series of episodes and comic situations, each of which is described in a separate act. In every act Jourdain is made a fool of his own unjustified ambitions. In the first act, the protagonist faces the flattery of dance and music teachers, in the second they are joined by fencing and philosophy teachers, each of them trying to prove the superiority of his subject and its value for a real aristocrat; the debate of pundits ends in a brawl.

The third act, the longest of the five, shows how blind Jourdain is when he allows his imaginary friend Count Dorant to steal money from himself, bribing with flattery, lies and empty promises. The fourth act of the comedy gives rise to a Turkish farce in which a servant in disguise initiates Jourdain into the ranks of the non-existent Turkish nobility. In the fifth act, blinded by his fulfilled ambitions, Jourdain agrees to the marriage of his daughter and maid.

Step One: Preparing for the Dinner Party

In the house of Jourdain, two masters are waiting for the owner - a dance teacher and a music teacher. The vain and stupid Jourdain aspires to become aristocrats and desires to have a lady of the heart, which became the Marquise Dorimena. He prepares a glorious feast with ballet and other entertainment, hoping to impress a noble person.

The owner of the house comes out to them in a bright robe, citing the fact that all aristocrats dress like this in the morning. Jourdain asks the opinion of the masters regarding his appearance, to which they scatter in compliments. He watches and listens to the program, cuts in to a pastoral serenade, and convinces the craftsmen to stay and look at his new, latest-fashion suit, which is about to be brought to him.

Act Two: The Teachers' Squabble and the New Suit

A fencing teacher comes to the house and a dispute arises among the masters about which of the arts is more necessary for an aristocrat: music, dancing or the ability to stab with a rapier. The argument escalates into a fight with fists and shouts. In the midst of a fight, a philosophy teacher enters and tries to calm down the raging masters, convincing them that philosophy is the mother of all sciences and arts, for which he receives cuffs.

After finishing the fight, the battered philosophy teacher begins a lesson from which Jourdain learns that, it turns out, he has been speaking prose all his life. At the end of the lesson, a tailor enters the house with a new suit for Jourdain. The bourgeois immediately puts on a new thing and bathes in the praise of flatterers who only want to get even more money out of his pocket.

Step Three: Plans

Going for a walk, Jourdain calls the servant Nicole, who laughs at the appearance of the owner. Madame Jourdain also comes to the noise. Looking at her husband's outfit, she tries to explain to him that with his behavior he only entertains onlookers and complicates life for himself and his loved ones. A wise wife is trying to convince her husband that he is behaving stupidly and that everyone is profiting from this stupidity, including Count Dorant.

The same Dorant comes on a visit, greets Jourdain affectionately, covers him with a wave of compliments regarding the costume and, along the way, borrows two thousand livres from him. Taking the owner of the house aside, Dorant informs him that he has discussed everything with the marquise and that evening he will personally accompany the noble person to dinner at the Jourdain house so that she can enjoy the gallantry and generosity of her secret admirer. Of course, Dorant forgets to mention that he himself takes care of Dorimena and the cunning count attributed all the signs of attention from the extravagant merchant to himself.

Madame Jourdain, meanwhile, is trying to arrange the fate of her daughter. Lucille is already married, and young Cleont is courting her, to whom the girl reciprocates. Madame Jourdain approves of the groom and wishes to arrange this marriage. Nicole happily runs to tell this news to the young man, because she is not averse to marrying Cleont's servant - Covel.

Cleont personally comes to Jourdain to ask for the hand of Lucille, but the madman, having learned that the young man is not of noble blood, flatly refuses him. Klenot is upset, but his servant - the cunning and shrewd Koviel - proposes to his master a plan by which Jourdain will gladly marry Lucille to him.

Jourdain sends his wife to visit his sister, while he waits for the arrival of Dorimena. The marquise is sure that dinner and ballet are a sign of attention to her from Dorant, who chose the house of Jourdain in order to avoid scandal.

Act Four: Dinner and Initiation into Mammushi

In the midst of a rich dinner, Jourdain's wife returns home. She is outraged by her husband's behavior and accuses Dorant and Dorimena of being a harmful influence. Discouraged, the marquise quickly leaves the feast, Dorant goes after her. Jourdain would also have run out for the marchioness, if not for the curious guests.

Coviel enters the house in disguise, who convinces Jourdain that his father was a full-blooded aristocrat. The guest convinces the owner of the house that the son of the Turkish Sultan, who is also crazy about his daughter, is visiting the city at that very time. Does Jourdain want to meet a promising son-in-law? By the way, the uninvited guest knows Turkish very well and could take the place of an interpreter during negotiations.

Jourdain himself is not himself with delight. He affectionately accepts the "Turkish nobleman" and immediately agrees to give him Lucille as his wife. Disguised as the son of the Sultan, Cleont speaks in gibberish, and Coviel translates, offering Jourdain immediate initiation into the ranks of the Turkish nobility - the non-existent noble rank of mammamushi.

Act Five: Lucille's Marriage

Jourdain is dressed in a robe and turban, given a crooked Turkish sword in his hands and forced to pronounce oaths in gibberish. Jourdain calls Lucille and hands her hand to the Sultan's son. At first, the girl does not want to hear about it, but then she recognizes Cleont under overseas outfits and happily agrees to fulfill her daughter's duty.

Madame Jourdain enters, she does not know about Cleont's plan, therefore she resists with all her might the marriage of her daughter and the Turkish nobleman. Koviel takes her aside and reveals his plan. Madame Jourdain approves of her husband's decision to immediately send for a notary.

Molière, "The Philistine in the Nobility": a brief analysis

To some extent, "The Tradesman in the Nobility" is just a light comedy-farce, but to this day it is a favorite work of European literature, and Mister Jourdain is one of Moliere's most memorable characters. It is he who is considered the archetype of the bourgeois with aristocratic ambitions.

The image of Jourdain is not dynamic and shallow, he stands out for one main character trait - vanity, which makes him a one-sided character. The depth of the inner world does not differ and other heroes. "The tradesman in the nobility" is distinguished by a minimum of characters. The deepest and most complete of them is Madame Jourdain. She is the least comical and personifies the voice of reason in this play.

Satire in the work is minimized, but clearly visible. Jean Baptiste Moliere easily ridicules the vanity and inability of a person to be in his place. In the person of Jourdain, a whole class of the French public is exposed to obvious ridicule - merchants who have much more money than intelligence and education. In addition to the bourgeoisie, flatterers, liars and those who want to get rich on someone else's stupidity receive a fair share of ridicule.

Classicism begins to take shape in France at the end of the 16th century. The beginning of its formation is associated with the name of the poet Malherbe, who wrote lofty odes. It received its most perfect artistic expression in the work of Corneille, Racine, La Fontaine and Molière. Features of the artistic system of classicism were also reflected in Moliere's comedy "The Tradesman in the Nobility".

First of all, it should be noted that the time of the formation of classicism coincided with the era of the dominance of metaphysics. The metaphysical way of thinking determined the features of the artistic thinking of the writers of the era of classicism. The phenomena of nature, as well as the phenomena of social life, were depicted by them out of their connection with each other, which led to the division of “nature” into sublime and base phenomena, virtuous and vicious, tragic and ridiculous.

Comedy has always depicted everyday life, and in its negative manifestations. Her heroes were morally inferior people, inferiority and contradiction with the "norm", "ideal" were revealed with the help of laughter. Laughter could be cheerful, but it could also be merciless, depending on what phenomena were discussed. In understanding the ridiculous, classicism remained at the level of the ancient theory, according to which the goal of comedy is to enlighten, ridiculing shortcomings. Disadvantages were considered the negative properties of a person in their everyday manifestation: eccentricity, extravagance, laziness, stupidity, etc. However, one should not assume that the comedy of classicism was devoid of social significance. The ideal of classicism was recognized as a person of a social warehouse, for whom the interests of the state and the nation were higher than personal interests. In accordance with this idea, comedy ridiculed character traits that reduced the social significance of the individual.

"The tradesman in the nobility" - already in the very title of Molière's comedy lies the meaning of the funny in the comedy. Taking as the main theme for her the attempt of the bourgeois to leave his estate and join the "higher circle", Molière, categorically condemning Jourdain for his blinding by the fake magnificence of the nobility, the loss of common sense, for his break with that social group that would later form the famous French " third estate”, speaks about the importance of preserving the true, natural in a person. The author puts the main idea of ​​the work into the mouth of Cleont: “To be ashamed of those from whom heaven destined you to be born into the world, to shine in society with a fictitious title, to pretend not to be what you really are - this, in my opinion, is a sign of spiritual meanness." "Shut up, they tell you! Both of you are ignorant. You don’t know what kind of pre-ro-ga-tivs this gives me! - Jourdain argues with Nicole and with her dearest half, who tried to reason with her husband, who was striving for high society. However, if Monsieur Jourdain's whims were limited to lessons alone, it would be half the trouble. An insane thought arises in his mind, not being a nobleman by birth, to acquire the manners of a nobleman, to connect with family ties with a nobleman. In his hands is the fate of two loving hearts - Cleonte and Lucille, whose engagement at the end of the comedy underlines how insignificant Jourdain's attempts to be who he really is not.

Thus, we see that the main purpose of comedy, adopted in classicism - to make people laugh, "to correct the temper with a mockery", that is, to educate individual representatives of society with laughter - is fully realized in "The Tradesman in the Nobility". The image of Jourdain, largely conditional, is based on the image of one of the most expressive features of his character: “Well, you won’t find another such madcap in the whole world!” In society, he occupies a fairly stable position, having achieved material wealth solely through his work and talent. However, the exorbitant claims of Jourdain conflict with the ignorance and extreme limitations of his mind. It is in this that the author sees the reason for his admiration for a foreign culture, which he does not know as his own. In the episode when Jourdain is initiated into mammamushi, this aspect comes to the fore. Firstly, the “initiation” scene itself is rather humiliating: Jourdain is put on his knees so that his hands touch the ground, and his back serves as a stand for the Koran. Muftis and Turks accompany the prayer with numerous blows with sabers: "Stick, stick, beat - it's not a pity." The mufti urges not to be ashamed of all this, since a "noble goal" has been set - initiation into mammamushi. Jourdain himself cannot really explain what “mamamushi” is, but, assured by the mufti that this is a high noble rank, he agrees to be executed. In his view, "mamamushi" is a certain dignity. Like a prayer, he repeats the meaningless words "Turk":

I ask for Giurdin

Its make a paladin,

Give him a halberdine

And send Palestine

On the galley brigantine

And with all the Saracens

Fight Christian.

The comical position of Jourdain is conveyed with the help of the author's irony. It exposes the contradiction between what the hero thinks about himself and how he is perceived by other characters, the author and the audience. Laughter acts as a form of evaluation, revealing the internal failure of the character of the hero.

Molière's comedy is characterized by a "trinity" - action, time and place. The action takes place in Paris, in the house of Mr. Jourdain within one day. The main events are connected, first of all, with the main character. Love conflict allows the author to bring positive characters to the stage. Coviel and Cleont, although they do not act according to their conscience, trying to deceive the gullible and stupid Jourdain, on the other hand, express the author's attitude towards the character.

The features of the language in "The Tradesman in the Nobility" correspond to the canons of the comedy of the era of classicism. Due to the fact that the characters of the comedy of classicism were carriers of certain properties of character, their speech was subordinated in each case to the disclosure of this property. A typical example is the dialogue between Covel and Cleont. Cleont does not have a noble noble origin, but he is sure that his ancestors occupied honorary positions and he himself will be able to take not the last place in the world thanks to his own efforts. At the same time, absolutely no one needs to be deceived by appropriating an undeserved title of nobility. Before us appears the character of an intelligent, well-bred, virtuous young man. Koviel is his servant. As much as these two characters occupy a different position in society, their speech is just as different. If the speech of Cleont is close to the speech of the heroes of the tragedy, then the element of the people is displayed in the speech of Covel. The author simultaneously gives statements of both characters who speak on the same topic, only in different words. For example, Cleont describes his love experiences: "How passionately I loved her, loved her to complete self-forgetfulness." Let's compare Covel's words on the same topic: "How hot it was for me when I fiddled with the skewer for her, hot to the point of exhaustion!" Despite the use of similar words (to the point of complete self-forgetfulness - to the point of complete exhaustion), the comic effect of the dialogues of Cleont and Covel is amazing.

As you can see, in the comedy "The Philistine in the Nobility" the features of classicism are manifested at all levels of the artistic system: the composition of the work, ways of depicting characters, means of expressing comedy, speech parties of heroes are subject to the laws of classicism.

Artistic features of Molière's comedy The tradesman in the nobility

The works of the outstanding French comedian Moliere reflected the problems and aesthetic searches of his time, and his fate reflected the position of the writer in the public life of France in the 17th century.

Moliere entered the history of world literature as the founder of "high comedy". Moliere created artistically perfect comedies with a tense plot and interesting characters. The plots of his comedies are based on the conflict known to the classicists - the opposition of passions to common sense. At the heart of comedy is the discrepancy between real events, as they are perceived by the characters. Molière saturates this general comical setting with historically reliable characters, reveals the most typical characters.

As an artist in his time, Moliere understood well what the public needed, and created plays that were popular. His talent lies in the fact that, while entertaining the viewer, he educates him, draws him to moral values. The names of many of his characters have become common and mean a person who has certain traits.

A vivid image is created by Molière in the comedy "The Tradesman in the Nobility". The protagonist Jourdain has everything a person could wish for: family, money, health. But Jourdain wanted to become a nobleman. This becomes his manic idea, which causes a lot of trouble to his family, but likes a whole bunch of charlatans who feed at his expense and make fun of him: hairdressers, shoemakers, "teachers" of etiquette. Enjoys the whim of Jourdain and the aristocrat Dorant. He knows that Jourdain is in love with the noble Dorimena, with whom he himself is not averse to becoming engaged. Dorant brings Dorimena to Jourdain's house, where a sumptuous dinner awaits them. On his own behalf, he gives the beauty the jewelry that Jourdain gave him for Dorimena. A comical situation arises, the characters speak, not understanding each other, each about his own: Dorimena thinks that Dorant gave the jewelry, and is indignant when Jourdain underestimates their value, wanting to look modest in the eyes of his chosen one. The desire to become a nobleman deprives Jourdain of the remnants of common sense: he does not agree to the marriage of his daughter Lucille with Cleont just because he is not a nobleman. But the witty servant of Cleont finds a way out. He disguises his master as a Turkish pasha, wooing Lucille for him. The comedy ends with a real celebration of fun. All the heroes get what they were striving for: three pairs of lovers unite (Cleont and Lucille, Dorant and Dorimena, Coviel and Nicole), and Jourdain becomes, albeit bizarre, but a nobleman.

Molière was rightly called the author of "high comedy". "The tradesman in the nobility" is a vivid proof of this. Behind the funny events of comedy, serious conclusions are hidden, and comical images become satirical. The behavior of Jourdain, Dorant is due to their position in society. Jourdain strives to become a nobleman in order to prove his worth to everyone and to himself. But Molière shows that a person should be valued for who he is, that everyone should do their own thing in life. Dorant is an aristocrat, but he has nothing but a title: no money (he borrows it from Jourdain), no aristocratic, lofty feelings. He uses Jourdain to impress Dorimena as a rich man. The marquise consents to the marriage because she considers Dorant really to be who he claims to be. The author cleverly took out her disappointment beyond the comedy.

In Moliere's comedies, common sense wins, but it is not a guarantee of human morality. On the example of negative characters, the author shows that an insidious, hypocritical person can be smart, and human virtues always win.