Prosper Jolyot de Crébillon
Prosper Jolyot de Crébillon was a French playwright whose career spanned from the early 18th century into the mid-18th century. He is best known for his contributions to neoclassical tragedy, producing seven notable plays between 1705 and 1726 that adhered to the traditional five-act structure and employed Alexandrine verse. His works, while popular, faced criticism for their melodramatic elements and complex plots, often drawing inspiration from Roman tragedians like Seneca. After a two-decade hiatus, Crébillon returned to writing with the play *Catilina* in 1748, which received acclaim and led to a collection of his tragedies being published shortly thereafter.
Crébillon's life was marked by personal tragedy, including the death of his wife and financial losses related to a failed investment scheme. He also played an important role in the literary scene, tutoring Jeanne Poisson, who later became the influential marquise de Pompadour and supported him during his later career. In addition to his literary endeavors, Crébillon served as a censor for the monarchy and was elected to the French Academy. His works are often viewed as precursors to the Romantic tragedy of the 19th century, and despite their peculiarities, they reveal a deep passion and creative spirit that continues to intrigue scholars and theater enthusiasts today.
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Prosper Jolyot de Crébillon
French playwright
- Born: January 13, 1674
- Died: June 17, 1762
Biography
The literary career of Prosper Jolyot de Crébillon (kray-bee-yohn) can be divided into two parts. Between 1705 and 1726, he wrote seven neoclassical tragedies, using the standard formula of five acts and Alexandrine verse. These dramas were well received, despite protests against an excess of melodrama. Then in 1748, after not writing for more than twenty years, Catilina was warmly praised, and within two years a collection of his tragedies appeared. Crébillon ended his career with Le Triumvirat, a play about the death of the Roman orator Cicero. {$S[A]Jolyot, Prosper;Crébillon, Prosper Jolyot de}
Crébillon was educated at the Mazarin Jesuit school. Like his father, he studied law in Besançon, after which he worked as a clerk in a law office in Paris. He suffered a reversal of fortune in 1720 when, shortly after the death of his wife, he lost a great deal of money in financier John Law’s disastrous land scheme in colonial Mississippi. He raised two sons, one of whom, Claude-Prosper Jolyot de Crébillon (known as Crébillon fils), became an accomplished novelist who depicted moral depravity in the aristocracy.
Many of Crébillon’s plays are imitations of Seneca’s lurid tragedies. Indeed, Romanesque elements are common ingredients, along with inflated diction, incomprehensible plots, and countless recognition scenes. These works represent a transitional phase in French theater history, between the era of Pierre Corneille and Jean Racine and nineteenth century Romantic tragedy. Voltaire recycled five of Crébillon’s plots, perhaps to provoke a rivalry, but the unassuming Crébillon took little interest in literary disputes.
Crébillon had the good fortune to tutor Jeanne Poisson when she was nineteen years old. Later, during the second phase of his career, he enjoyed her patronage when she was the influential marquise de Pompadour and mistress to Louis XV. Crébillon worked as a censor for the monarchy from 1735 to 1745, after which he was granted a sinecure in the Royal Library and a generous pension. He was elected to the French Academy in 1731. Many consider his plays to be bizarre historical curiosities; close reading, however, reveals genuine passion, impressive vigor, and stageworthy inventiveness.
Bibliography
Ciureanu, Petre. Crébillon. Geneva: M. Bozzi, 1965. A study in French.
Dutrait, Maurice. Étude sur la vie et le théâtre de Crébillon, 1674-1762. 1895. Reprint. Geneva: Slatkine Reprints, 1970. An early study.
Lancaster, Henry Carrington. French Tragedy in the Time of Louis XIV and Voltaire, 1715-1774. 2 vols. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1950. Discusses the later part of Crébillon’s career. Together with Lancaster’s Sunset (below), offers a systematic account of Crébillon’s contribution to the history of French drama.
Lancaster, Henry Carrington. Sunset: A History of Parisian Drama in the Last Years of Louis XIV, 1701-1715. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1945. Discusses the early part of Crébillon’s career.
LeClerc, Paul O. Voltaire and Crébillon Père: History of an Enmity. Banbury, England: Voltaire Foundation, 1973. From the series Studies on Voltaire and the Eighteenth Century.