High Society, Fashion, and Comic Hypocrisy

By Tom Shafer

The characters in Molière's The Misanthrope inhabit a world different from that of many of the playwright's other works: we are viewing the actions of people at the very top of the social ladder of 17^th-century France. For example, the foppish Acaste and Clitandre, who come into Célimène's house in the second act, are marquesses, the second-highest rank one can hold in the country. They can spend most of the day with Célimène, if they so choose, for their only remaining duty at court is to attend the coucher of Louis XIV, the formal going-to-bed ceremony of the king, to which only the highest members of the court were invited to attend (and assist the king in his evening toilet). The characters of The Misanthrope own estates, hold power, and are immensely wealthy. They are not the bourgeois household of Tartuffe, they are not members of the upper-middle class--they are the court.

Through Alceste, the misanthrope of the title, Molière mocks and attacks the behavior of the highest level of his society. But Alceste is no Tartuffe, censuring those about him, while giving the appearance of a puritan, set apart from society. No, Alceste, himself an owner of estates, yearns to be accepted by the very society he condemns, and that was seen from the first in the costume which Molière wore when he played Alceste, a costume that represents the latest fashion--expensive, tasteful, and stylish.

We do not know much about this costume from the script, other than it is adorned with green ribbons. We know what Alceste wore--at least in the first productions--from an inventory of Molière's effects, made after his death:

The justaucorps is a doublet, originating in 1665 as a court uniform that signified access to the king. As Stephen V. Dock notes, its use by Alceste is "somewhat puzzling," since, as a mode of fashionable dress, it was not adapted by society until 1670, well after the first performance of The Misanthrope in 1666. Indeed, the frontispiece to the 1667 edition of the play shows the seated Alceste not wearing a justaucorps. Dock agrees with Tom Lawrenson's supposition that "Molière updated this costume in 1670 and wore it in fourteen subsequent performances." In Brissart's 1682 illustration of Le misanthrope, we see the first scene of the play: Philinte speaks to Alceste, depicted as Molière wearing an embroidered, buttoned, and be-ribboned justaucorps.

"The richness of the costume," Dock points out, "is outstanding." An Alceste in such a costume is not only wearing the latest fashion, but is exposing "the hypocrisy of his own claim that he loathes everything about the court."

Alceste is one of the most arresting characters in drama--a man ruled by his passionate distaste for society and its hypocrisy, who is also deeply in love with a flighty, witty coquette who lives only for the social life that Alceste continually attacks and denounces.

Molière created more than a one-dimensional character in Alceste, for while it is not unique to shape a comic character who contradicts himself, it is unusual to fashion one who is both self-contradictory and painfully self-aware. From the first scene in the play, Alceste informs us that he knows how absurd his position is. Molière also creates moments in which Alceste engages in extreme actions just to maintain his "position" in his social game. At these times, he knows he may be turning himself into an ass, and although he may not like it, he is finally overcome by a righteous passion and commits to his argument. Alceste's self-knowledge costs him something, and, if presented with care, these moments within the play can open up the humanity of the character in ways that are unusual to a comedy.

No one has, to my knowledge, attempted to produce Hamlet as a comedy, nor has anyone tried to present Barefoot in the Park as a tragedy, yet The Misanthrope has, over its life on the stage, enjoyed successful productions both as a comedy and as a tragic romance (although not in the same production). It has been possible to do this because of the different layers of awareness, contradiction, and foolishness that Molière has written into the character of Alceste--a character whose contradictions he revealed from the first moment of the initial productions of the play, when the misanthrope appears on stage, seated in full wig, wearing a curved-brimmed hat, fashionable shoes, and richly embroidered, highly fashionable justaucorps. It was (and is) an Alceste as hypocritical as the society he condemns for hypocrisy, a "supremely paradoxical creature," as David Whitton has called Alceste: "a fish which cannot abide water, nor live out of water."

The Misanthrope by Molière, directed by Dale McFadden, plays at 8:00 P.M., November 3, 4, 6-11, in the University Theatre.

Works Cited

Dock, Stephen V. "Authentic Costuming for Tartuffe and Le misanthrope." Approaches to Teaching Molière's Tartuffe and Other Plays. Ed. James F. Gaines and Michael S. Koppisch. New York: MLA, 1995. 117-36.

Lawrenson, Tom. "The Wearing o' the Green: Yet Another Look at Ôl'Homme aux Rubans Verts.'" Molière: Stage and Study. Essays in Honour of W. G. Moore. Ed. W. D. Howarth and Merlin Thomas. Oxford; Clarendon, 1973. 163-69.

Whitton, David. Molière: Le Misanthrope. Glasgow: U of Glasgow French and German Publications, 1991.