The enigma of “Tartuffe”

Molière, two steps from the libertine club Les Chandelles

Abstract

The essay takes its cue from the important notes of Claude Bourqui about the existence, in the Tartuffe, of a dense network of “dirty words”, obviously disguised, to put at the center of the comedy not the character of Tartuffe, but the couple of spouses in crisis. Elmira stages a very dangerous erotic game to find out who has become her husband, who neglects her, interested only in Tartuffe. A contemporary reading of the work, as when a broken couple enters a libertine club, during a soirée trio. The title alludes to the fact that the statue of Molière, in Paris, is 30 meters away from the most exclusive libertine club in the French capital, Les Chandelles.