SOURCE: "Conclusion," in The Theater of Marivaux, New York University Press, 1958, pp. 255-67.

In the essay below, McKee summarizes the innovations Marivaux introduced into French theater and surveys his influence on subsequent dramatists.

Marivaux … was the most original French dramatist of the eighteenth century. In his theater as a whole and in the details of the individual plays, in experimentation with new themes and in the expression of philosophical ideas, his originality stands out.

Perhaps the most salient feature in Marivaux's complete theater is his break with the classical tradition. Though it cannot be said that Marivaux is entirely free of the influence of inherited dramatic material, still the special flavor he gives old subjects sets him apart from his con-temporaries. If he derived an occasional idea from a comedy by Molière, from the canevas of the commedia dell'arte, or from a seventeenth-century novel, what he borrowed...