ABSTRACT
Corneille Laure persecutee, probably produced in 1637, has a love intrigue, a happy ending and a fairy-tale atmosphere. Though styled a tragicomedy, no doubt because of the royal standing of the characters and a peril of death which does not materialize, it comes in fact nearer to romantic comedy. Another tragicomedy, Belisaire, which in fact would qualify as a tragedy by the sombreness of its story, appeared in 1643 and resembled the tragedies which Corneille was to write in the same decade. A more plausible assumption is that Rotrou wrote his tragedy to give the Hotel de Bourgogne a martyr play to compete with Corneille’s Theodore, which the Marais produced in the same year 1645. Rotrou’s dramatic verse, while not reaching the heights of gravity and pompe so admired in some of Corneille’s plays, is a more than adequate instrument.
