Poetics and problems of the play “The Libertine” by Eric-Emmanuel Schmitt

Abstract

The article studies the analysis of the dramatic legacy of Eric-Emmanuel Schmitt, a famous modern French-speaking writer. The article discusses one of his most famous plays, <i>The Libertine</i>. We studied the genre-typological properties of the play and the system of its characters, we actualized the reality of the prototypes of the actors of the play, traced the architectonics of the play. We studied the peculiarities of the organization of plots, protagonist images and their systems in the play <i>The Libertine</i>, we analyzed the motives, leitmotifs, chronotopes, themes and issues, which allowed to single out the main conflict of the play. We used comparative-historical, comparative-typological and structural methods to study the stated issues. One of the key factors in choosing the main character of the work, Denis Diderot, whose work inspired the playwright not only to write a dissertation on philosophy and was the source of many worldview ideas, but also to write a fictional literary work and biography. The play <i>The Libertine</i> is written in the style of French classicist works with a focus on the unity of time, place, action. The famous Enlightenment philosopher Denis Diderot, who is working on the article <i>Morality</i> in his famous <i>Encyclopedia</i>, appears in the play by Eric-Emmanuel Schmitt as the embodiment of immorality. Each character introduced by Eric-Emmanuel Schmitt into the play represents one of the facets of the moral issue around which the play revolves. The problem of morality is constant in this play by Eric-Emmanuel Schmitt, that makes it sharpness, dynamism, it revolves around the whole dramatic conflict and the pervasive action of the play. The specificity of the philosophy of language of Eric-Emmanuel Schmitt, on the one hand, is based on dialogical discourse, and on the other, manifested in the comic, in humor. In this sense, humor is not a tool to ridicule Denis Diderot, but rather calls for a more lenient attitude of the reader to human weaknesses. Typical of Eric-Emmanuel Schmitt's work is the open finale of the play, the actualization of important metaphysical questions that remain unanswered.