I’m unsure how to review this, other than to say I’m ambivalent about it and move on. I don’t think it will be memorable beyond my learning the term “comedy of humors.” Perhaps I would feel more strongly if I saw a live production or read it in French. ( )

4½ stars. This play is full of humorous word-play so make sure that you have a good translation. ( )

I listened to this as part of the digital audiobook of "The Moliere Collection" - this was the 6th and final play of the collection, though I listened to it 5th.

The L.A. Theatre Works recording of this Richard Wilbur translation was excellent & the play is one of Molière's best. ( )

This a review of four audio live performances: Caedmon 1969 (Richard Easton); BBC 1998 (David Schofield); BBC 2013 (Neil Caple); LATW 2014 (Brian Bedford). According to Wikipedia it is "Molière's best known work today". According to Rousseau it was Molière's best work. I love it, language gymnastics, Cirque du Soleil of the rhyme. The themes are timeless and the wit has lost nothing with time. Célimène's acid take-downs are awesome. Of the four recording there is no question Richard Easton takes the show with energy and verve. In second place is David Schofield who is slower. The other two are lacking conviction. This is the kind of play you can listen to repeatedly , no wonder it's a classic, but which performance makes a difference. ( )

Read this in a Hachette edition I bought on the banks of the Seine a half-century ago (for 3 of 5 vols,10 francs, $2), and read a bit in Paris (where we attended one at Comedie Francaise), then five plays after a defeat in grad school. Now I start reviewing the source of Wycherley's Plain Dealer, Moliere's Misanthrope. One big difference from Wycherley's derivative, Manly uses a dialect, and prose.

Moliere rhymes 12-syllable couplets; translator R Wilbur (fellow grad of my Amherst College) uses rhymed pentameters in English-- though I don't recall if I ever read his translation of this particular play.

Moliere's title character is Alceste, who begins the play overhearing his friend Philinte praising someone whose name he doesn't even know. Alceste says this ends their friendship. In fact, Alceste continues to attack effusive friendship, evidently the heart of Louis XIV's society. He next criticizes Celimene, he supposes his girlfriend, but she is equally friendly to every guy, "tout l'univers est bien reçu de vous"(II.i, p.124, vol III). Especially one particular rival, whom Alceste describes, Is it his long nails on short fingers? His blond wig? Lace hanging from his knees? "Est-que par l'ongle long qu'il porte au petit doigt"(p.123, vol III).

Hold on, Alceste is too sincere, "trop sincère" when he fails to praise the poem Oronte wrote, preferring a little memorized verse, roughly ballad stanza (but three-beat and two): were the king to give him Paris, if he gave up his friend, he'd keep his friend, not Paris (I.ii, p.111). Many scenes later a guard orders him to follow to apologize and accept the verses he'd called "execrable" in private (II.vi, 126).

After Celimene encounters a woman who also criticizes her "taking all the men," she finally agrees to Alceste, who surprises in the final scene, plans to leave everybody. ( )