Reading Order
La Reine morteLa Reine morte Reading Order
La Reine morte (Queen after Death, 1942) by Henry de Montherlant is the most performed play of the French classical revival — a historical tragedy set in medieval Portugal in which the old King Ferrante orders the execution of Inês de Castro, the secret wife of his son the Infante, on the grounds that her existence compromises his dynastic and political plans. The play is based on a seventeenth-century Spanish original (by Vélez de Guevara) but Montherlant transforms it into a meditation on power, solitude, and the paradox of a king who knows that his decision is unjust but carries it through because power demands it. Montherlant was the leading figure of a neo-classicist group that sought to revive the tradition of Corneille and Racine against the commercial boulevard theatre of the interwar period; La Reine morte was followed by Malatesta (1946), Le Maître de Santiago (1947), and Port-Royal (1954), each a substantial verse drama in the classical tradition. Montherlant was also a major novelist (Les Jeunes Filles, 1936–1939; Les Célibataires, 1934) and essayist.
Where to start
Read La Reine morte first — it is the most theatrically accomplished and most performed of Montherlant's plays. Then read Le Maître de Santiago (1947) for the extreme case of Montherlant's aristocratic ethos: a sixteenth-century Spanish knight who refuses all compromise with the new world. Read Les Célibataires (1934) for the major novel.
Complete La Reine morte Book List
- 1Buy
La Reine morte
Henry de Montherlant·1942·Start here — the masterpiece; the medieval Portuguese tragedy; the most performed Montherlant play - 2Buy
Le Maître de Santiago
Henry de Montherlant·1947·The Master of Santiago — the extreme case: a sixteenth-century knight who refuses all engagement with the new world; Montherlant's most austere vision - 3Buy
Malatesta
Henry de Montherlant·1946·The Renaissance condottiere Sigismondo Malatesta — the cynical man of power without Ferrante's tragic self-awareness; read after La Reine morte - 4Buy
Port-Royal
Henry de Montherlant·1954·The Jansenist convent during the persecution of 1664 — Montherlant's finest late play; the conflict of religious conscience and royal authority - 5Buy
Les Célibataires
Henry de Montherlant·1934·The Bachelors — the major novel; two impoverished aristocrats who cannot adapt to the modern world; the novelistic counterpart to the plays
La Reine morte — Frequently Asked Questions
Who was Inês de Castro and why does her story recur in European literature?
Inês de Castro (c.1320–1355) was a Galician noblewoman who became the secret wife of Dom Pedro, heir to the Portuguese throne; she was executed by order of King Afonso IV (Montherlant's 'Ferrante'), and when Dom Pedro became king, he reportedly exhumed her body, crowned it, and required his court to pay homage to the dead queen ('reine morte'). The story became a legend of absolute love, posthumous vindication, and the conflict between love and political necessity; it was dramatized by Vélez de Guevara (Reinar despues de morir, 1652), Montherlant, and many others. The legend's power comes from the paradox that love triumphs after death, but only because the lover survives to make it triumph.
What is Montherlant's aristocratic ethos?
Montherlant's work — plays, novels, essays — is organized around what he called an aristocratic ethics: the belief that the highest human beings are those who maintain their standards without compromise, even when those standards lead to isolation, defeat, or death. This ethics is anti-democratic (the many are always wrong), anti-Christian in its emphasis on human greatness rather than humility, and deeply nostalgic — it looks to a medieval or Renaissance world of clear hierarchies and uncomplicated heroism as its model. The Maître de Santiago refuses to go to the New World because it is ignoble; Ferrante orders Inês's execution because he cannot face the reminder that love exists where he feels only power and solitude.
Why is Montherlant's reputation controversial?
Montherlant's reputation is complicated by several factors: his aristocratic ethos was used by Vichy sympathizers during the Occupation, and his 1941 essay 'Solstice de juin' was explicitly Vichyite; he was accused of collaboration after the Liberation, though he was not tried. His treatment of women in his fiction is often dismissed as misogyny (the Jeunes Filles tetralogy satirizes intellectual women); and his homosexuality — disclosed publicly only after his death — gives a retrospective reading to the male friendship and homosocial exclusion in the plays. His defenders argue that his work should be separated from his politics and that the plays remain the finest French neo-classical drama of the century.
What is the French neo-classical revival in theatre?
The French neo-classical revival is the attempt, primarily between the two world wars and in the immediate postwar period, to revive the tradition of Corneille and Racine against both the commercial boulevard theatre and the avant-garde. Montherlant, Claudel, Giraudoux, and Anouilh all participated in this revival in different ways: Montherlant through direct imitation of the five-act verse drama; Claudel through symbolist religious drama; Giraudoux through the ironic classical myth rewriting; Anouilh through the modern Greek tragedy rewriting. The revival was partly nationalist (the classical tradition as distinctively French) and partly an aesthetic program (the discipline of classical form as a counter to theatrical commercialism).
How does La Reine morte compare to Racine?
La Reine morte is the most Racinian of twentieth-century French plays: the tragedy is produced entirely by character (Ferrante's inability to accept weakness, his contempt for the love he cannot feel), the plot is minimal, the violence occurs offstage and is reported, and the dénouement is announced from almost the beginning and can be deduced from the premise. But Montherlant's Ferrante is more psychologically complex and self-aware than Racine's characters — he knows he is acting unjustly and says so — and the play's language is modern prose rather than Alexandrine verse. The combination of Racinian formal structure and modern psychological self-consciousness is what makes La Reine morte the successful neo-classical play that Montherlant's other works did not quite achieve.
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