40 Fun Facts About The Misanthrope

The title of Molière's The Misanthrope comes from two Greek words meaning hatred of what?

Mankind is the target: the word joins the Greek misos, hatred, to anthropos, human being, the root that also gives English anthropology.

Which film star made her West End debut in 2009 in Martin Crimp's modern version of The Misanthrope?

Keira Knightley played Jennifer, an American film star, opposite Damian Lewis at London's Comedy Theatre.

The Misanthrope opened in 1666 under which French king, builder of Versailles and Molière's patron?

Louis XIV backed the playwright so firmly that in 1664 he stood godfather to his firstborn son.

What does Célimène refuse to do at the end of The Misanthrope, losing Alceste's offer of marriage?

Leave society with him is the one thing she cannot accept: at twenty, she says, solitude frightens her, so Alceste goes off alone.

Armande Béjart, the first Célimène in The Misanthrope in 1666, had what real-life tie to Molière?

She was his wife, some twenty years his junior, and he played the jealous Alceste opposite her.

Which Molière comedy about a pious fraud had already been banned when he wrote The Misanthrope?

Tartuffe was banned in 1664 after its first showing at Versailles, and the fight to stage it in public dragged on for five years.

Molière, The Misanthrope's first Alceste, collapsed in 1673 while acting in which of his own plays?

The Imaginary Invalid cast him as a hypochondriac; seized by a coughing fit on stage, he finished the show and died hours later.

What kind of poem does a vain courtier read to Alceste in Act I of The Misanthrope?

A sonnet it is, and Alceste's blunt verdict so offends its powerful author that he is summoned to answer for the insult.

Which philosopher's 1758 essay on theatre attacked The Misanthrope for making fun of Alceste?

Rousseau called the play Molière's best work, yet hated that audiences were invited to laugh at Alceste's high ideals.

Which Avengers TV star earned a 1975 Tony nomination as Célimène in The Misanthrope on Broadway?

Diana Rigg came over with the National Theatre production from London's Old Vic, playing opposite Alec McCowen's Alceste.

Which easy-going friend of Alceste in The Misanthrope argues that polite society needs tact?

Philinte, first played by the actor La Grange, serves as Alceste's foil: he sees the same faults in people and simply shrugs.

Which courtier's love poem does Alceste scorn in The Misanthrope, landing both men before a tribunal?

Oronte claims he dashed the verses off in a quarter of an hour, and he is also one of Alceste's rivals for Célimène.

Which prude in The Misanthrope lectures Célimène on her reputation, then pursues Alceste herself?

Arsinoé gets as good as she gives: Célimène answers her friendly warning with an equally sweet account of what people say about prudes.

Which cousin of Célimène in The Misanthrope first admires Alceste, then accepts another man's hand?

Éliante is the sincere one of the play's women, and her match with Alceste's best friend gives the comedy its one happy couple.

What status lets Célimène in The Misanthrope receive a crowd of suitors in her own Paris home?

A young widow of twenty, she answers to no father or husband, which is why Alceste can only argue with her, never forbid her.

How is Célimène finally exposed in the last act of The Misanthrope, to the fury of her suitors?

Her letters are read aloud by two suitors who compare notes: each had been promised her heart, and each finds himself mocked in the other's copy.

How does Célimène amuse her guests in Act II of The Misanthrope, to Alceste's disgust?

Mocking absent friends is her party piece: she skewers one acquaintance after another, and Alceste blames the laughing courtiers for egging her on.

Which body of high officers summons Alceste in The Misanthrope to settle his quarrel over a poem?

The Marshals of France get no retraction: Alceste will only say he is sorry he cannot like the verses, and the two men are made to make peace.

In The Misanthrope, Célimène privately mocks Alceste as the man who wears ribbons of which colour?

Green ribbons are her nickname for him; knots of ribbon were high fashion for young noblemen at the time, worn even with military dress.

In The Misanthrope, what does Alceste recite to show a courtier what honest love poetry sounds like?

An old popular song, about a lover who would turn down the king's gift of Paris to keep his sweetheart, beats the courtier's wordplay in Alceste's view.

Molière wrote The Misanthrope in which twelve-syllable line, the staple of French classical drama?

The alexandrine carries its main stresses on the sixth and last syllables, which gives every line a pause at the midpoint.

Molière's The Misanthrope helped define which stage genre, later a hallmark of Restoration London?

Comedy of manners mocks the codes of a fashionable class, here the salons of Paris, where a white lie counts as good breeding.

Which Paris playhouse staged the first performance of Molière's The Misanthrope on 4 June 1666?

The Palais-Royal was the troupe's home stage, and most of Molière's best-known comedies opened there, The Miser among them.

Molière, author of The Misanthrope, was the stage name of which Paris furniture merchant's son?

Jean-Baptiste Poquelin was baptised in Paris in 1622; his father supplied furnishings to the royal household.

The Misanthrope's subtitle calls Alceste an 'atrabilaire', a man ruled by which of the four humours?

Black bile was the humour doctors linked to sadness and gloom; the full subtitle is usually put into English as the Cantankerous Lover.

Which Greek playwright wrote Dyskolos, an ancient comedy sometimes translated as The Misanthrope?

Menander won first prize with it in Athens, but the text was lost for centuries until a papyrus copy turned up in Egypt in the 1950s.

Which Shakespeare hero, a ruined Athenian who retreats to a cave, did Lucian call 'the Misanthrope'?

Timon curses the walls of Athens and lives on roots in the wilderness, a tragic cousin of Molière's comic Alceste.

William Wycherley based which 1676 comedy about a distrustful sea captain on The Misanthrope?

The Plain Dealer was later reworked by Voltaire as La Prude, sending Molière's plot back across the Channel.

Which twice Pulitzer-winning American poet translated The Misanthrope into English verse in 1955?

Richard Wilbur's version was still earning honours decades on: a special Drama Desk Award followed its 1983 Broadway revival.

Which English poet, author of the poem V, adapted The Misanthrope for the National Theatre in 1973?

Tony Harrison went on to make verse versions of the Oresteia and the medieval Mysteries for the same company.

What has Alceste become in Jacques Rampal's 1992 sequel to The Misanthrope, set twenty years later?

A cardinal, and a powerful one: Célimène and the Cardinal reunites the old lovers in verse, with Célimène now married and a mother of four.

Which poet who named the Republican calendar's months wrote a 1790 sequel to The Misanthrope?

Fabre d'Églantine made the sequel's villain out of Alceste's easy-going friend, recast as a plain egotist; its author was guillotined in 1794.

Which duke, later governor to the Dauphin, did Paris take for the original of Molière's Alceste?

Montausier is said to have threatened Molière with a beating over the likeness, then seen the play and sent for him to offer thanks.

Which future film star played Alceste's bumbling valet in The Misanthrope on Broadway in 1983?

Stanley Tucci had the small comic part in a cast led by Brian Bedford, with Mary Beth Hurt as Célimène.

Liz Lochhead's modern version of The Misanthrope is set in the early years of which revived body?

The Scottish Parliament setting lets her satire land on Scottish Labour and its uneasy dealings with the media.

Which Killing Eve star led the National Theatre's present-day rewrite of The Misanthrope in 2026?

Sandra Oh headed a version in which Alceste becomes Alice, a successful novelist famous for speaking her mind.

Which Kill Bill star played opposite Roger Rees in an updated Misanthrope in New York in 1999?

Uma Thurman starred for the Classic Stage Company in a version that moved the play to celebrity-obsessed London.

In The Misanthrope, Célimène's foppish suitors Acaste and Clitandre both hold which noble title?

Marquis it is, and a letter printed with the first edition joked that marquises were the most incorrigible characters of all.

Why does a furious Alceste suddenly propose to Célimène's cousin in Act IV of The Misanthrope?

To take revenge on Célimène, whom he believes unfaithful; the cousin gently answers that such anger fades as soon as the lover is forgiven.

What sets off the opening quarrel of The Misanthrope, when Alceste scolds his closest friend?

Hugging a near-stranger is the offence: the friend lavished affection on a man he hardly knew, and Alceste treats it as a betrayal of honesty.