The Barber of Seville/The Marriage of Figaro
A French courtier, secret agent, libertine and adventurer, Beaumarchais (1732-99) was also author of two sparkling plays about the scoundrelly valet Figaro—triumphant successes that were used as the basis of operas by Mozart and Rossini. A highly engaging comedy of intrigue, The Barber of Seville portrays the resourceful Figaro foiling a jealous old man's attempts to keep his beautiful ward from her lover. And The Marriage of Figaro—condemned by Louis XVI for its daring satire of nobility and...
Search in google:
'He has everything - pleasantry, seriousness, reason, vigour, pathos, eloquence of every kind...', Voltaire once said of Beaumarchais, 'and yet he strives after none of them... 'It was also said of Beaumarchais (1732-99) that he had only one character - himself - and that Figaro epitomizes all his creator's vices. This does not seem to have stood in the way of his success. If The Barber of Seville and its sequel, The Marriage of Figaro, are known to us almost exclusively through the operas of Rossini and Mozart, then that is our loss, for Beaumarchais's effortless light touch makes these two plays high points in eighteenth-century European comedy.
