CORNEILLE (Pierre). D.Sanche d'Arragon, heroic comedy. Impri - Lot 30

CORNEILLE (Pierre). D.Sanche d'Arragon, heroic comedy. Imprimé à Rouen [par Laurent Maurry], se vend à Paris, chez Augustin Courbé, 1650. small in-12, (16)-83-(uneblanche)pp. half parchment, fine black frieze and fillet in parchment border on boards, red edges; parchment a little soiled with small tear at head (xixesiècle binding). First edition in-12, published the same year as the original in-4. An innovative heroic comedy. Breaking away from the imitation of his Spanish models, Pierre Corneille retains the framework but, out of a desire to explore his literary art, invents his own subject, treated in an original way. He himself hesitated over the nomenclature of his work, conscious of having innovated, as he explains here in the dedicatory epistle to the secretary of Prince William of Orange, the poet and composer Constantijn Huygens de Zuylichem (father of the physicist): "Voicy un poëme d'une espèce nouvelle, qui n'a pas d'exemple chez les Anciens. Vous connoissez l'humeur de nos François, ils ayment la nouveauté, je hazarde non tam meliora, quam nova [non tant du meilleur que du neuf], sur l'espérance de les mieux divertir." A mirror image of the Fronde crisis. Premiered in 1649, this heroic comedy resonates with the troubles of the time in many ways: the Queen of Castile asserts her rights in the face of the claims of the great feudal lords, just as centralized French royal power resisted the attacks of the Grands, and the question of the relationship between merit and birth is addressed, in transparent reference to the accusations of low birth against Mazarin: an unknown cavalier, Don Sanche is first scorned, then finally recognized as being of princely nature.