French Receptions of Shakespearean Tragedy

The philosopher Alain synthesized the French approach to Shakespeare when he announced: ‘If Hamlet fell down to Earth, naked, without its procession of admirers, the critics would mock it, not without the semblance of a reason.’ Contrasting the quest for the essence of a work of art as opposed to its mere existence, he emphasized an enduring dualism in the French reception of Shakespearean tragedy. Between Voltaire’s rejection and the Romantics’ adoration of the ‘black sun’, Shakespeare generated a dialogue in French art. Starting with the critical reception, this chapter shows how Shakespearean tragedy became the instrument of a reflection on Liberty. The stage dynamic of destruction and regeneration in the treatment of Shakespearean tragedies produced a call for new liberated approaches to French dramatic language. Shakespeare thus became a laboratory where translators, adaptors, stage directors, and actors would put their trade to the test of a protean script and free themselves from the strictures of national tradition.