Although Molière's comedy is from long ago, some of the characters still seem fresh, though obviously farcical. The charlatans, hypocrites, and buffoons that people his plays are types that recur throughout history. His heavy use of stock characters might strike a 21st century reader as hopelessly simplistic, but in the broad comedy of his style, it works better than many other writers of the same time period. A must read for anyone interested in theatre enough to explore its history. ( )

Moliere is a must-read for any student of the theatre, officially or not. While his style--especially the rhyming verse plays--may distract some, his themes are timeless and his characters inventive and entertaining.

One of the great playwrights in the Western canon, Moliere is occasionally looked over by the general public in favor of the more obvious English choices. Yet his work, though steeped very much in the politics of his era, has a timeless quality akin to Shakespeare or Ibsen, or any other classic playwright you would like to name. A satirist of the first order, his "Tartuffe" is a classic assault on religious hypocrisy, while his romantic farces are the pinnacle of that genre.

This is not to say that Moliere is a straightforward dramatist, even by today's standards. He experimented with form and style, writing plays about his own plays (his "Critique of The School for Wives" addresses the criticism leveled at that play, and works as a examination of criticism as a form) and performing other experiments that today would have been called post-modern.

Anyone interested in comedy as a form, or drama in general, will get to Moliere eventually. He is one of the touchstones of classic drama, and still a delight to this day.

(This review originally appeared on zombieunderground.net) ( )