| The Devil and the Good Lord | |
|---|---|
The French edition | |
| Written by | Jean-Paul Sartre |
| Date premiered | 7 June 1951 |
| Place premiered | Théâtre-Antoine, Paris |
| Original language | French |
The Devil and the Good Lord (French : Le Diable et le Bon Dieu) is a 1951 play by French philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre. The play concerns the moral choices of its characters, warlord Goetz, clergy Heinrich, communist leader Nasti and others during the German Peasants' War. The first act follows Goetz' transformation from vicious war criminal to a "good" person of noble deeds, as during a siege of the town of Worms, he decides not to massacre its citizens.
French is a Romance language of the Indo-European family. It descended from the Vulgar Latin of the Roman Empire, as did all Romance languages. French evolved from Gallo-Romance, the spoken Latin in Gaul, and more specifically in Northern Gaul. Its closest relatives are the other langues d'oïl—languages historically spoken in northern France and in southern Belgium, which French (Francien) has largely supplanted. French was also influenced by native Celtic languages of Northern Roman Gaul like Gallia Belgica and by the (Germanic) Frankish language of the post-Roman Frankish invaders. Today, owing to France's past overseas expansion, there are numerous French-based creole languages, most notably Haitian Creole. A French-speaking person or nation may be referred to as Francophone in both English and French.
Jean-Paul Charles Aymard Sartre was a French philosopher, playwright, novelist, political activist, biographer, and literary critic. He was one of the key figures in the philosophy of existentialism and phenomenology, and one of the leading figures in 20th-century French philosophy and Marxism. His work has also influenced sociology, critical theory, post-colonial theory, and literary studies, and continues to influence these disciplines.
A warlord is a leader able to exercise military, economic, and political control over a subnational territory within a sovereign state due to their ability to mobilize loyal armed forces. These armed forces, usually considered militias, are loyal to the warlord rather than to the state regime. Warlords have existed throughout much of history, albeit in a variety of different capacities within the political, economic, and social structure of states or ungoverned territories.
The play was first performed at the Théâtre-Antoine in Paris, where it opened on 7 June 1951 and ran until March 1952. [1] This production was directed by Louis Jouvet. [1] Of all his dramatic writings, The Devil and the Good Lord was Sartre's favourite. [1] He based the character of Goetz on his analysis of the psychology and morality of the writer Jean Genet, which he had developed more substantially in his Saint Genet (1952). [1]
Paris is the capital and most populous city of France, with an area of 105 square kilometres and an official estimated population of 2,140,526 residents as of 1 January 2019. Since the 17th century, Paris has been one of Europe's major centres of finance, commerce, fashion, science, and the arts.
Jules Eugène Louis Jouvet was a French actor, director, and theatre director.
Drama is the specific mode of fiction represented in performance: a play, opera, mime, ballet, etc, performed in a theatre, or on radio or television. Considered as a genre of poetry in general, the dramatic mode has been contrasted with the epic and the lyrical modes ever since Aristotle's Poetics —the earliest work of dramatic theory.
