Birth Marks: The Tragedy of Primogeniture in Pierre Corneille, Thomas Corneille, and Jean Racine

ISBN-13: 9780812235500 / Angielski / Twarda / 2000 / 304 str.

Richard E. Goodkin

Opis

Through a study of the evolution of inheritance issues in seventeen tragedies written over the course of half a century the Corneille brothers, Pierre and Thomas, and by Jean Racine, Richard E. Goodkin questions the pervasive assumption that classical tragedy, a form written for the aristocracy, is informed exclusively by an aristocratic ethic. Instead, a fresh reading of both canonical and noncanonical texts demonstrates that even the most formal body of literature produced by French classical writers expresses a conflict between a declining aristocratic hierarchy based on inherited privilege and a rising capitalistic ethic that favors competition and enterprise.