person
Moliere
also: Мольер, Jean-Baptiste Poquelin
French comic playwright whose "The Tricks of Scapin" is named as part of Davydov's benefit-performance bill.
Reading notes
- To A. S. Suvorin, 27 May 1891. Bogimovo. §6 that Moliere might seem tedious
Moliere invoked as a byword for canonical, untouchable classic theater; the mere thought that hippodrome-style open-air spectacle might make Moliere seem tedious by comparison is, Chekhov jokes, exactly the kind of idea that would scandalize Moscow's theatrical conservatives.
- In Moscow §12 immortal Moliere
Invoked as an empty exclamation of highbrow despair, the kind of stock phrase deployed to sound cultured without engaging with anything specific about Moliere's work.