Philippe Quinault, Dramatist

The Author: William Brooks is Professor of French at the University of Bath, UK. He has published extensively in seventeenth-century French studies, notably the theatre and especially Quinault, early baroque opera librettos, and the life and writings of Elisabeth Charlotte, Duchess of Orleans. He is co-editor, with Rainer Zaiser, of Religion, Ethics, and History in the French Long Seventeenth Century and Theatre, Fiction, and Poetry in the French Long Seventeenth Century, two volumes of papers from a major conference of French early modern scholars, published by Peter Lang in 2007.

Contents: A Brief History of Quinault Criticism - Characters: Heroes and Villains - Social and Political Themes - Plot and Artifice - The Transmission of Information - False and Mistaken Identity - Visual Action and Music - Genre and Tone - Quinault's art poétique - Quinault, his Audience, and his Critics - Quinault and Racine.

«This book by William Brooks is a major contribution to the history of seventeenth-century French theatre and it should be acquired by all research libraries.» (Edmund J. Campion, The European Legacy)
«This much-needed study blows away the critical cobwebs and the oft-repeated errors and clichés (...).» (C.J. Gossip, New Zealand Journal of French Studies)
«Très bien documenté, le livre de William Brooks est incontestablement appelé à remplacer l'étude d'Etienne Gros et à devenir le nouvel ouvrage de référence sur le sujet.» (Stella Spriet, H-France Review)