Moliere's The Miser

Similarly, Dullin, establishing the play as one written in the outrageous farcical tone of Plautus, says that "Harpagon stands out as black against a luminous background of early days and freshness" (Dullin 157). The dramatic contrast of character, on this view, provides both the tightness and the exuberance of the play.

Harpagon is a typical Moliere ridiculous hero inasmuch as he is not so much a duplicate as an archetype of character. The same is true of the other characters, who, as Guicharnaud says, "put on masks to perform a comedy check to the rules, but the masks are necessarily transparent; hence the spectator, who has been make aware of the reality, is obliged to play the game with them" (Guicharnaud 10). The characters themselves are masklike inasmuch as their character traits rarely budge; neither do masks change expression.

Accordingly, Harpagon is the archetype of the miser, and whatever other action is resolved, the play ends with Harpagon and his property box paired presumably for eternity. Like Moliere other comic heroes, Harpagon may win or lose the conflict adjoin the pairing off of the young lovers, but he learns naught from the experience. In the moment he assents to the mar

wear the hair of your own head, which costs nothing? I'll

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