C.D. Warner, et al., comp.
The Library of the World’s Best Literature. An Anthology in Thirty Volumes. 1917.
Jean Racine (1639–1699)
Racine, Jean Baptiste (rä-sēn’). The illustrious French dramatist; born at La Ferté-Milon, Dec. 21, 1639; died at Paris, April 26, 1699. His works include: ‘Nymphs of the Seine’ (1660), an ode; ‘Amasie,’ a comedy, now lost; ‘Ovid’s Amours,’ a comedy, now lost; ‘The Thebaid’ (1664), his first staged tragedy, although he had previously written ‘Theagenes and Chariclea,’ a tragedy, which he suppressed; ‘Alexander’ (1665), a tragedy; ‘The Chaplain’s Wig’ (1665?), a parody of ‘The Cid,’ and written partly in collaboration; ‘Andromache’ (1667); ‘The Pleaders’ (1668), a comedy modeled upon Aristophanes; ‘Britannicus’ (1669); ‘Berenice’ (1670); ‘Bajazet’ (1672); ‘Mithridates’ (1673); ‘Iphigenia’ (1674), pronounced by Voltaire the masterpiece, of the French theatre; ‘Phædra’ (1677); ‘Esther’ (1689); ‘Athalie’ (1691), his last dramatic work; ‘Abridgment of the History of Port Royal’; ‘Letters’; and some historical memoranda concerning the campaigns of Louis XIV. (See Critical and Biographical Introduction).