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Abstract
Alain-René Lesage's life (1668-1747) encompasses the end of the reign of Louis XIV, the Regency, and the first two decades of the reign of Louis XV. His career as a dramatist began in 1700 at the prestigious Comédie-Française where he became successful with Crispin Rival de son maître (1707) and Turcaret (1709). The latter, portraying a financier, provoked such a cabal among members of this profession that it was quickly dropped. After this bitter experience, Lesage stopped writing for the Comédie-Française and eventually turned to the "Théâtre de la Foire" (the theater that performed at seasonal fairs) for which he wrote from 1712 to 1738.
Lesage's theater is about parody and satire with a pervasive sense of "game playing", in the fullest sense of the expression. The author's dramatic art is composed of various elements which are combined so as to constitute an "architecture du jeu". The French word "jeu" takes on various meanings in English such as, gambling, game, playing, acting, etc.
This dissertation explores the ways in which the playwright connected the themes of gambling, speculation, social transaction or social game, bluffing, and his own experience as a theater writer for the Foire. This study also establishes a parallel between these prevalent themes in Lesage's corpus and a shift in the mentality and values of French society at that time. It is divided into five chapters.
Chapter one deals with the history of gambling in France and the evolution of its representation on stage since the late years of the reign of Louis XIV by authors such as Dancourt, Regnard and Dufresny. Chapter two concentrates on cheating, speculation and John Law's system. Both activities, gambling and speculating, involve risk taking and had an impact on the structures of society, a theme that is covered in the third chapter. The above chapters challenge the principles of authority and hierarchy, a theme which reaches a peak with the "war" between the théâtre de la Foire and the official ones, as analyzed in chapter four. Chapter five covers parody, a device that questions the supremacy of the official theaters and thereby challenges the established culture and aesthetics. Lesage's "architecture du jeu" gives the impression that existence itself was perceived as being theatrical.
