The McNaughtens

Jean-François RegnardProject Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

3.0

Word count: 88K words
Chapters: 9

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.The McNaughtens by Jean François RegnardAuthor: Regnard, Jean François, 1655-1709,Language: English, Class: PQ: Language and Literatures: Romance literatures: French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Release Date: Jan 1, 2004

Editor's review

The McNaughtens is an English-language electronic edition of a work by the French playwright Jean François Regnard, a public-domain dramatic text from Project Gutenberg. Regnard is known chiefly for comedy, and this work is best read from the perspectives of theater history and translation: how character arrangement, dialogue rhythm, and comic conflict carry across languages. Its value lies not in novelty of plot but in offering a sample of late seventeenth-century French comedy and a view of how an English translation handles lines, forms of address, and humor. Readers familiar with Molière and other comedies of the period may read it in comparison, noting similarities and differences in subject and technique. The electronic edition makes it easy to search character names and scene numbers, suiting script read-throughs or classroom analysis of excerpts. Note that this is a historical text whose jokes and context are remote from our time; first-time readers may find it alienating, and background notes will make it much smoother.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Readers interested in French classical comedy and theater history
Students who need an English play script for read-throughs or classroom analysis
Readers familiar with Molière who want to compare comedies of the same period
Language learners studying comedy translation and the handling of dialogue

Not a good fit for

Readers who want only light modern comedy and are unused to classical dialogue rhythms
Readers wholly unfamiliar with seventeenth-century French society who are unwilling to consult background materials
Those expecting a long narrative or novel-like reading experience

Reading tips

Skim the character list and scene structure first, then read act by act and sort out the relationships.
Try reading the dialogue aloud to feel the comic rhythm and the tonal differences after translation.
Read a brief background on seventeenth-century French comedy beforehand to reduce the sense of distance.
Read alongside a similar comedy by Molière and note similarities and differences in character types and joke design.

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

FAQ

What country is this work from, and what kind of text is it?

It is an English-language electronic edition of a comedy by the French playwright Jean François Regnard—a play script, not a novel. Begin with the characters, dialogue, and scene structure, and treat it as a textual sample for understanding late seventeenth-century French comedy.

Can I understand it without a background in theater?

Yes, but some preparation helps. Look over the character list and act structure first, then move into the dialogue; if you are unfamiliar with seventeenth-century French comedy, read a brief theater-history introduction first and it will go much more smoothly.

Does the English translation lose the original's jokes?

Translation inevitably involves choices about forms of address, puns, and tone, and comedy especially so. Watch the rhythm of dialogue and the characters' reactions rather than hunting for jokes line by line; if possible, consult the French original or relevant notes to better understand the translator's choices.

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About the author

Jean-François Regnard Author · French · 1655–1709

Jean-François Regnard (1655–1709) was a French comic playwright, born in Paris and died at Grillon Castle. In his youth he travelled widely across Europe and was at one point captured by Algerian pirates and held as a slave, an episode that remains one of the best-known aspects of his life. From 1688 onward he wrote for the Italian Comedy and the Comédie-Française. His representative works include The Gambler, The Absent-Minded Man and The Twin Brothers, as well as The Universal Heir, regarded as his masterpiece. His comedies are noted for ingenious plotting and lively language, and he has often been called the finest comic poet after Molière. Three of his works are held in this collection—The Unforseen Return, The McNaughtens and The Follies of Love—showing that his comic subjects often revolve around family misunderstandings, disputes over property and human folly; public information on his education and teachers is limited, so no conjecture is offered here.