A family is torn apart over a proposed marriage. On one side, the mother
Philaminte, her sister-in-law Bélise and her daughter Armande. All three are infatuated
with art and science, and would like to see Henriette, the youngest of the family, marry
the poet Trissotin. On the other hand, father Chrysale and his brother Ariste, good
bourgeois men concerned with their own interests, want Henriette to marry Clitandre,
a young aristocrat well introduced at Court. Behind this comedy of
marriage, two a priori irreconcilable conceptions of life
are revealed and clash. For a long time, it was thought that in Les Femmes
savantes, Molière was wickedly mocking women's desire for emancipation,
with a very misogynistic brutality.
Philaminte, her sister-in-law Bélise and her daughter Armande. All three are infatuated
with art and science, and would like to see Henriette, the youngest of the family, marry
the poet Trissotin. On the other hand, father Chrysale and his brother Ariste, good
bourgeois men concerned with their own interests, want Henriette to marry Clitandre,
a young aristocrat well introduced at Court. Behind this comedy of
marriage, two a priori irreconcilable conceptions of life
are revealed and clash. For a long time, it was thought that in Les Femmes
savantes, Molière was wickedly mocking women's desire for emancipation,
with a very misogynistic brutality.
