Without renouncing the influence of Pierre Corneille, they nevertheless tended more and more to set their plays within a single stage decor, using fewer and fewer personages, simplifying their plots, and concentrating them in shorter texts. Contemporary playwrights thus presented less and less dramatic action, interesting themselves rather in the passions of their personages--and transforming the regular or "ruleconscious" theater of the 1630s and 1640s into the disciplined and passion-oriented classicist theater of the following decades. While Racine's
Thébaide and
Alexandre show both Corneillian and later classical tendencies, Racine expressed more purely classicist literary ideals in his third tragedy,
Andromaque.
Andromaque and La Du Parc
Between the first performances of Alexandre and the first performances of Andromaque in 1667, Racine's way of life changed considerably. Apparently dissatisfied with Molière's production of his Alexandre, he secretly rehearsed the play with the actors of another troupe, who played Alexandre in competition with Molière in December 1665. The resulting theatrical scandal gave Racine the reputation of a devious and unscrupulous young man. As if to confirm this evil reputation, an ungrateful Racine also published a pamphlet against Jansenism, attacking his former teachers of Port-Royal.
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