Bourgeois Tragedy - in England and France

In England and France

There are a few examples of tragic plays with middle-class protagonists from 17th century England (see domestic tragedy), but only in the 18th century did the general attitude change. The first true bourgeois tragedy was an English play: George Lillo's The London Merchant; or, the History of George Barnwell, which was first performed in 1731. In France, the first tragédie bourgeoise was Sylvie by Paul Landois, which came out in 1755. Only a few years later came two plays by Denis Diderot: Le fils naturel was first staged in 1757 and Le père de famille in the following year; while these plays were not strictly tragedies, they treat bourgeois lives in a serious manner atypical of contemporary comedy and provided models for more genuinely tragic works.