Theater
Discussions about the origins of non-religious theater ("théâtre profane") -- both drama and farce—in the Middle Ages remain controversial, but the idea of a continuous popular tradition stemming from Latin comedy and tragedy to the 9th century seems unlikely.
Most historians place the origin of medieval drama in the church's liturgical dialogues and "tropes". At first simply dramatizations of the ritual, particularly in those rituals connected with Christmas and Easter (see Mystery play), plays were eventually transferred from the monastery church to the chapter house or refectory hall and finally to the open air, and the vernacular was substituted for Latin. In the 12th century one finds the earliest extant passages in French appearing as refrains inserted into liturgical dramas in Latin, such as a Saint Nicholas (patron saint of the student clercs) play and a Saint Stephen play.
Dramatic plays in French from the 12th and 13th centuries:
- Le Jeu d'Adam (1150–1160) - written in octosyllabic rhymed couplets with Latin stage directions (implying that it was written by Latin-speaking clerics for a lay public)
- Le Jeu de Saint Nicolas - Jean Bodel - written in octosyllabic rhymed couplets
- Le Miracle de Théophile - Rutebeuf (c.1265)
The origins of farce and comic theater remain equally controversial; some literary historians believe in a non-liturgical origin (among "jongleurs" or in pagan and folk festivals), others see the influence of liturgical drama (some of the dramas listed above include farcical sequences) and monastic readings of Plautus and Latin comic theater.
Non-dramatic plays from the 12th and 13th centuries:
- Le Dit de l'herberie - Rutebeuf
- Courtois d'Arras (c.1228)
- Le Jeu de la feuillé (1275) - Adam de la Halle
- Le Jeu de Robin et de Marion (a pastourelle) (1288) - Adam de la Halle
- Le Jeu du Pèlerin (1288)
- Le Garçon et l'aveugle (1266–1282)
- Aucassin et Nicolette (a chantefable) - a mixture of prose and lyrical passages
Select list of plays from the 14th and 15th centuries:
- La Farce de maître Trubert et d'Antrongnard - Eustache Deschamps
- Le Dit des quatre offices de l'ostel du roy - Eustache Deschamps
- Miracles de Notre Dame
- Bien Avisé et mal avisé (morality) (1439)
- La Farce de maître Pierre Pathelin (1464–1469) - this play had a great influence on Rabelais in the 16th century
- Le Franc archer de Bagnolet (1468–1473)
- Moralité (1486) - Henri Baude
- L'Homme pécheur (morality) (1494)
- La Farce du cuvier
- La Farce nouvelle du pâté et de la tarte
In the 15th century, the public representation of plays was organized and controlled by a number of professional and semi-professional guilds:
- Clercs de la Basoche (Paris) - Morality plays
- Enfants sans Souci (Paris) - Farces and Sotties
- Conards (Rouen)
- Confrérie de la Passion (Paris) - Mystery plays
Genres of theater practiced in the Middle Ages in France:
- Farce - a realistic, humorous, and even coarse satire of human failings
- Sottie - generally a conversation among idiots ("sots"), full of puns and quidproquos
- Pastourelle - a play with a pastoral setting
- Chantefable - a mixed verse and prose form only found in "Aucassin et Nicolette"
- Mystery play - a depiction of the Christian mysteries or Saint's lives
- Morality play
- Miracle play
- Passion play
- Sermon Joyeux - a burlesque sermon
Read more about this topic: Medieval French Literature
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