About the Play:

The Misanthrope (English language version of Le Misanthrope) is a full-length comedy by Molière, translated into English verse by Pulitzer Prize winner Richard Wilbur. Razor-sharp wit inflames a competitive game of survival in the salons of 17th century France where, in this world of "finest appearances," one man's blunt honesty shatters his society's delicate web of manners. Often considered to be Molière's Hamlet, The Misanthrope is a wickedly scathing satire.

The Misanthrope is a searching comic study of falsity, shallowness, and self-righteousness through the character of Alceste, a man whose conscience and sincerity are too rigorous for his time. Outraged and disheartened by the vain flattery and calculated duplicity of his fellow men, Alceste declares that henceforth he will speak only the truth – no matter what offense this might give. His philosophic friend Philinte counsels him to temper his rashness, but Alceste claims that he can no longer tolerate the conventions of saying one thing to a person's face and another behind his back. Ironically, Alceste is enamored of the young widow Celimene, whose malicious tongue and unceasing coquetry make her the embodiment of the very situation he professes to detest. Ultimately Alceste's directness involves him in a lawsuit, and then a showdown with Celimene. But in the end it is Alceste who rejects the match when confidential letters are disclosed in which Celimene has set down scathing remarks about all her would-be lovers, Alceste included. Self-righteously he declares that he will renounce the world and seek a place where honesty can still flourish. As the curtain falls, however, the unruffled Philinte steps forward once more, taking Alceste in hand and urging him to accept things as they are and for what they are, pointing to the cynical moral that it is the wiser course to accept for the best what cannot be changed for the better. The Misanthrope is a scintillating comedy of hypocrisy, lying, shallowness, and self-righteousness that remains as relevant today as it was when it was written in the 17th century.

Le Misanthrope was first performed in 1666 at the Théâtre du Palais-Royal in Paris, and is considered by many to be Molire's masterpiece. Richard Wilbur's subtle verse translation The Misanthrope was produced in 1955 with great success by the Poets' Theatre in Cambridge, Massachusetts. It was presented in 1968 at the Lyceum Theatre on Broadway in New York City and in 2011 at the Stratford Festival.

Cast: 3 female, 8 male

What people say:

"For the first time in 300 years, a play of Molière has the English translation it deserves." — Commonweal

"…surely the best translation of Molière ever done into English." — Hudson Review

"Mr. Wilbur has given us a sound, modern, conversational poetry and has made Moliere's The Misanthrope brilliantly our own." — The New York Times Book Review

About the Playwright:

Molière was the stage name of Jean Baptiste Molière (1622-1673). His plays achieved great success and elicited enormous controversy with their religious irreverence.

Richard Wilbur (1921-2017) was an acclaimed American poet and literary translator. A former chancellor of the Academy of American Poets and United States Poet Laureate, he is one the 20th century's most eminent American poets and literary translators. He won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry – twice – among many other awards. He also established himself as the finest translator of Molière and other French playwrights. His playful, rhyming couplets of Moliere's Tartuffe and The Misanthrope were often called the definitive editions of the classic 17th-century satires.