La guerre civile romaine dans la tragédie française (1550-1650). Analyse poétique et politique

Abstract

The initial question at the origin of the research pertains to the relevance of the political reading of French tragedies from 1550 to 1650, a question raised by the importance of Roman history in the choice of the themes of the tragedies. Based on a limited corpus of 14 plays, those which use the exempla from the history of the Roman Civil War, it shows first that the French tragedies under study express a variety of political ideas and positions, and that some of them perform what one might call a work of elucidation, first regarding the political situations linked to the wars of religion and later to the affirmation of an absolute monarchy. Neither directly political pamphlets, nor scholarly treatises, these tragedies express these positions and thoughts only indirectly through the poetics of each play as a whole. Their political reading therefore requires a poetic analysis. This analysis reveals that the history of the Roman Civil War was a meaningful allegorical material at work in each of the plays studied, but also that it provided a common medium of expression to the authors and to certain protagonists of French history. In particular, the Roman exempla provided a coding of the tripartition of the opposing camps. The use of these exempla varies not only according to the affinities of the authors with their respective political circles (Protestants, leaguers, « political » Catholics) but also according to the period of creation. During the XVIth century, the tragedies granted the vanquished the opportunity to voice their grievances to the victors ; in the XVIIth century, Octavian and the nature of his reign are the center of attention.