with so many of her sex; she was of the race of tender, not of
passionate lovers; of the race, too, of those who, scorning the lighter
forms of gallantry, and yet unable to preserve their virtue, are so
often destined to bitter disappointment, disillusion, and remorse.
"Relative of the Monimes, the Bérénices, the La Vallières, and the
Aïssés," says M. Paléologue, in his fine study of the actress, "she has
their melting tears, their touching grace, and their voluptuous modesty.
But her true originality among the women of her time lay in the
conception that she formed of love. We know the singular change that
this sentiment had undergone beneath the dissolving influence of the
morals of the Regency; all that had made up to that time for the
nobility and poetry of passion had fallen beneath the blows of the
reigning philosophy and the persiflage of the salons. In this
transformation the woman had lost more than the man. She had been taught
that modesty and fidelity were grandiloquent words devoid of meaning,
and, freeing herself from all romantic illusion, and clinging only to
the positive and agreeable in her amorous intrigues, she displayed
everywhere a cynical libertinism.
"It was the honour of Adrienne to resist this contagion. The gift of her
person was always a pledge of the heart. She loved not by caprice, not
by vanity, but by a moral inclination, with an ardour, a
conscientiousness, and a gravity profound."[66]
The first of the actress's adorers was the Baron D----, a young officer
of the Régiment de Picardie, which formed part of the garrison of Lille.
Of him we know nothing, save that, after the _liaison_ had lasted some
months, he died suddenly, an event which occasioned his mistress such
terrible grief that she is said to have seriously contemplated
destroying herself. To the baron succeeded a certain Philippe Le Roy,
"officer of the Duke of Lorraine," by whom, in 1710, Adrienne had a
daughter, baptized as Élisabeth Adrienne. M. Le Roy, however, appears to
have proved fickle, for, soon afterwards, we hear of a third lover, a
provincial actor named Clavel, brother of Mlle. Fonpré.
With Clavel Adrienne corresponded, and two of her letters to him have
fortunately been preserved, the only love-letters of this woman who
loved so much that have come down to us. It is much to be regretted that
the rest of this correspondence has been lost, as they reveal the
actress in a very favourable light: warm-hearted, sincere, loyal, and
disinterested.
The first letter, written some time in the year 1710, is in reply to one
from Clavel, which she has been impatiently awaiting:--
* * * * *
"I have at last received that letter so eagerly anticipated, and for
which I have been astounding Notre Dame des Carmes with my prayers. I
can assure thee, my dear friend, that I have had no rest since thy
departure, both on account of my uneasiness at not receiving news of
thee and of finding myself inconvenienced as I am. I hope to be better
now, since I have reason to believe that thou lovest me still and that
thou art well. Take care of thyself, I beg of thee, since thy health is
as precious to me as my own. I shall be charmed to learn that thou art
enjoying thyself, provided that I lose by it nothing of what is mine,
and that thou dost not write to me less often.... Assuredly, I believe
that thou hast a kind heart, and, consequently, art faithful to thy poor
Lecouvreur, who loves thee more than herself.... I embrace thee with all
the tenderness of my heart, and swear to thee a constancy proof against
all things."
* * * * *
From the second letter, which was written two years later, and which M.
Larroumet declares to be "one of the tenderest and most touching
letters to be found in literature, real or imaginative, worthy of
comparison with the famous letter of _Manon Lescaut_," it would appear
that Clavel had promised to marry Adrienne, or, at least, given her
reason to believe that such was his intention; and she refers to the
matter with a frankness, a delicacy, and a forgetfulness of self rarely
met with where personal interests are at stake:--
* * * * *
"I hardly know what I ought to think of your[67] neglect, at a time when
everything ought to alarm me. Be always persuaded that I love you for
yourself a hundred times more than on my own account. Time will prove to
you, my dear Clavel, what I swear to you to-day. Entertain for me the
sentiments that I shall entertain for you all my life, for all my
ambition is bounded by that. With all the attachment that I have for
you, I should be in despair if you did anything for me with repugnance.
Reflect well that you are still master. Consider that I have nothing and
that I owe a great deal, and that you will find greater advantages
elsewhere. For my part, I have nothing, save youth and good will, but
that does not adjust matters. I speak to you plainly, as you see, and I
tell you frankly things which are able to make you think of me as one
whom you ought to avoid. Here is a chance to take your own part. Have no
consideration. Make no promise that you do not intend to keep; were it
necessary for you to promise to hate me, it seems to me that it would be
easier for me to bear than to find myself deceived.... I tell you again,
my dear Clavel, that your interests are dearer to me than my own.
Follow the course which will be most pleasing to you. I know you to be
of a disposition which will prompt you to behave generously and perhaps
to surpass me; but yet once again reflect well. Act like the honest man
that you are and follow your own inclination, without troubling about
the possible consequences. I shall resign myself, by some means or
other, as well as I can, whether I gain or lose you. If I have you, I
shall have the sorrow of not rendering you as happy as I should wish; my
own happiness will perhaps make me forget the pain.... If I lose you, I
shall strive at least not to do so entirely, and I shall still retain
some place in your esteem. If you are happy, I shall have the pleasure
of knowing that I have not prevented it; or, if you are not, I, at any
rate, shall not be the cause, and I shall endeavour in some way to
console myself."
* * * * *
The result of Clavel's reflections was that he came to the conclusion
that marriage with a young woman who "had nothing and owed a great deal"
might prove but an indifferent bargain for an ambitious young actor; and
Adrienne, after a somewhat lengthy period of solitude, accepted the
protection of Comte François de Klinglin, son of the _préteur royal_, or
first magistrate, of Strasburg. To him, at the beginning of the year
1717, she bore a second daughter, Catherine Françoise Ursule; but the
ill-fortune which had attended her previous _liaisons_ still pursued
her, for, almost immediately after this event, her lover abandoned her,
in order to contract a wealthy marriage, to which he had been long urged
by his family.
The marriage of the father of her child threw poor Adrienne into the
depths of despair. Too proud to reproach him with his perfidy, and yet
too sensitive to remain to witness its consummation, she determined to
leave the city, which must henceforth have for her such painful
associations, and, having obtained permission to make her _début_ at the
Comédie-Française, at the close of the theatrical year, she set out for
Paris. Her two children she left at Strasburg, where she had them
educated with great care, and on her death, in 1730, made ample
provision for them. The elder, daughter of Philippe Le Roy, afterwards
married the musician Francoeur the younger, who, in 1757, was
appointed director of the Opera; the younger, daughter of the faithless
Klinglin, became the wife of a M. Daudet (or Dauvet), a magistrate at
Strasburg.
* * * * *
It was on May 14, 1717, that Adrienne made her first appearance before
the Parisian public, in the title-part in the _Électre_ of Crébillon,
and as Angélique in _George Dandin_--that is to say, in both tragedy and
comedy. Notwithstanding the fact that the Czar, Peter the Great, then on
a visit to Paris, was to be present at the Opera that evening, the house
was crowded, for the _débutante_ had brought a great reputation with her
from the provinces, while not a few playgoers remembered her
performances when a child at Madame du Gué's and in the Temple. The
expectations of the public were not disappointed. "Her success was so
prodigious," writes d'Allainval, "that it was remarked that she had
begun as great actresses usually finish"; and a perfect storm of
enthusiasm followed the fall of the curtain.
Nor did the heroine of the evening fail to confirm the advantage she
had gained. A few days later, she gave a masterly rendering of the rôle
of Monime in Racine's _Mithridate_, which will be remembered as one of
Mlle. de Champmeslé's most brilliant creations, speedily followed by
other triumphs as Bérénice, Irené in _Andronic_, Alcmène in
_Amphitryon_, and Pauline in _Polyeucte_; and, on June 20, a vacancy
having in the meanwhile arisen, she was received into the company and
allotted a _demi-part_.
For thirteen years, that is to say until her death, on March 20, 1730,
Adrienne reigned the almost unquestioned queen of the Comédie-Française,
passing from triumph to triumph, associating her name with a great
variety of characters in tragedy, and attaining a popularity with the
playgoing public such as no actress had ever before enjoyed. "A lofty
soul, great enthusiasm, constant study, a passionate love for her art,"
says Sainte-Beuve, "all combined to make of her that ideal of a great
_tragédienne_, which until that time does not appear to have been
realised to this degree. Mlle. Duclos was only a representative of the
declamatory school, and if Mlle. Desmares and the Champmeslé had had
great and splendid parts, they certainly never attained to the all-round
perfection of Adrienne Lecouvreur. When the latter appeared, she had no
other model than her own taste, and she created."[68]
As the French theatre had been founded in imitation of the ancients,
without much regard for the difference of manners, in the same way, its
dramatic declamation was ruled by obscure traditions, independently of
the difference in languages. When at the theatre of the Hôtel de
Bourgogne, the art had hardly freed itself from its first awkwardness,
some erroneous ideas of the elocution of the Greeks and the stage system
of the Romans made of the actor's delivery a kind of measured chant.
Favoured by the construction of the verses of the great seventeenth
century dramatists and the brilliant successes of Mlle. de Champmeslé,
this monotonous chant passed from the Rue Mauconseil to the
Comédie-Française, where, at the time of Adrienne's appearance, it had
become so firmly established that to the great majority of the company
and a large number of their patrons any revolt against its sway seemed
something like sacrilege. So long as Baron had remained on the stage
some check had been imposed on this deplorable custom, for Baron,
educated in the school of Molière, a strenuous advocate of naturalness,
had remained faithful to the traditions of the Palais-Royal. But his
abrupt retirement, in 1696, in the flower of his age, left the adherents
of the rival school in undisputed possession of the field, and for more
than twenty years nothing occurred to interfere with the reign of
inflated declamation, which was carried by the successors of Mlle. de
Champmeslé to lengths which provoked the ridicule and disgust of foreign
visitors.[69]
Adrienne's phenomenal success was, in a great measure, due to the fact
that she had the courage and good sense to break with the old traditions
of the theatre, and abandon this stilted and artificial style of
elocution for simpler and more natural modes of speech. "The charming
Lecouvreur," wrote the Italian actor Riccoboni, the _jeune premier_ of
the Comédie-Italienne, in his didactic poem, _Dell' arte
rappresentativa_, "is the only one who does not follow the road along
which all her comrades run at full speed. If she happens to weep or
complain without terrifying us, as the others do by their bawlings, she
touches the heart so profoundly, that we become affected with her."[70]
This natural style of delivery seems to have been originally imposed
upon Adrienne by her physique, which was more delicate than vigorous.
Her voice, though singularly pleasing, was not remarkable for extent and
power, like Mlle. de Champmeslé's, but she used it with such consummate
skill as to vary its modulations according to the sentiments she desired
to express. "Although her voice is very weak," says the author of the
_Lettres historiques_, "she pleased the public at first, and continues
to please it; because it finds in her a novel style, natural and the
more agreeable, in that she has studied how to control it and to
proportion it to her strength; and thus one might say that the weakness
of her chest has contributed to this kind of perfection." The _Mercure_,
of March 1730, confirms the anonymous writer: "She had not many tones in
her voice, but she knew how to lend to them infinite variety." Moreover,
she seems to have possessed the rare gift of clearness of pronunciation,
"the orthography of the actor's art," and seldom indeed had so pure and
distinct a delivery been heard upon the stage.
For this last qualification Adrienne was indebted to the counsels of
César du Marsais, the grammarian-philosopher, as, when she first
appeared on the stage of the Comédie-Française, her pronunciation was
far from perfect; she understood the true meaning of the words of her
parts, but delivered them in a way which considerably discounted their
value, and thus, according to Régnier, touched the hearts, and irritated
the ears of the more fastidious critics at one and the same time.
D'Allainval relates that on the evening of her _début_, while the
theatre was ringing with the applause of the delighted audience, an
elderly man, seated at the back of a box, refrained from joining in the
general enthusiasm, and contented himself with remarking from time to
time, in a low tone, "_Bon, cela!_" His behaviour was much commented
upon by those who sat near him, and duly reported to Adrienne, who, on
learning that it was Du Marsais, became curious to learn the reason of
the qualified approval of one who appeared to be a critic of some
discernment, and accordingly sent him a very courteous note inviting him
to dine with her _tête-à-tête_.
Du Marsais came, but, before sitting down to table, he begged the
actress to do him the favour of reciting a tirade from one of her
favourite rôles. Adrienne readily consented, but was not a little
surprised at only obtaining for her trouble an occasional "_Bon, cela_."
Mortified by her guest's comparative indifference to her talents, she
inquired in what she had failed to please him. "Mademoiselle," replied
Du Marsais, "so far as my judgment goes, no actress has ever given
promise of greater talents than yours, and, in order to eclipse probably
all your predecessors, I will venture to promise that all that is
required on your part is to give to each word the exact emphasis
necessary to express its meaning."
Adrienne begged the grammarian not to be sparing of his advice, and,
following it religiously, soon succeeded in correcting her faulty
pronunciation.
It must not be supposed that Adrienne was able to effect the overthrow
of a style of elocution which had reigned almost unchallenged since the
foundation of the Comédie-Française without encountering strenuous and,
in some cases, acrimonious opposition from its many champions.
Mesdemoiselles Duclos and Desmares, prompted, no doubt, as much by
jealousy of the newcomer as by loyalty to the traditions in which they
had been trained, were particularly bitter in their resistance, and,
supported by the Quinault coterie,[71] did not confine themselves to
legitimate protests or to sustaining against her promising _débutantes_,
but subjected the young actress to a variety of petty persecutions.
Régnier, in his _Souvenirs et études du théâtre_, cites a number of
extracts from the registers of the Comédie, from which it appears that a
favourite practice of Adrienne's enemies was to cause her to be fined on
all kinds of pretexts: for being late for rehearsal, for not wearing the
costume prescribed for her part, and so forth. On one occasion, a kind
colleague inquired if she were aware that the anagram of her name was
_Couleuvre_ (viper); and during the run of Voltaire's _Hérode and
Mariamne_, Mlle. de Seine, who, two years later, became the wife of
Quinault-Dufresne, carried her insolence so far that the Gentlemen of
the Chamber, within whose jurisdiction the theatre lay, were obliged to
interfere, and direct the _semainiers_, as a number of players who
governed the theatre in rotation were called, "to deduct the sum of one
hundred livres from the share of Mlle. de Seine, for unseemly behaviour
towards Mlle. Lecouvreur, and to give her warning that she would be
dismissed from the troupe in the event of a repetition of the offence."
The climax of the campaign against Adrienne had, it seems, been reached
some time before this incident. In September 1723, Philippe Poisson, a
retired member of the Comédie-Française, submitted to the company, under
a _nom de guerre_, a comedy in one act, entitled _l'Actrice nouvelle_,
which was nothing less than a personal satire on Adrienne, her art, and
her private life. The play, in Adrienne's absence, was read to the
assembled troupe by the elder Quinault, who, in the speeches assigned to
the heroine, imitated the voice and gestures of the _tragédienne_ so
cleverly as to send the lady's enemies into convulsions of merriment. It
was at once resolved to accept the play, and Mlle. Duclos and her
friends doubtless indulged in much gleeful anticipation as to what their
rival's feelings would be when she found herself publicly caricatured
before her admirers in the boxes and pit. Unfortunately for the success
of this malicious scheme, the secret, though well kept, leaked out, and
Adrienne lost no time in bringing the matter to the notice of the
authorities, who issued an order forbidding the production of _l'Actrice
nouvelle_.
That Adrienne should have triumphed so completely as she did over
tradition and jealousy was due to two causes. In the first place, she
succeeded in securing the immediate, and almost unanimous, approbation
of the playgoing public, who, when afforded an opportunity of comparing
the rival methods of elocution, pronounced without hesitation, and in no
uncertain way, in favour of the innovation. The second was the
unexpected intervention of Baron, who, in April 1720, at the age of
sixty-seven, suddenly resolved to return to the scene of his many
triumphs, and, delighted to find that an actress had arisen who shared
his own views on the subject of elocution, lent her all the
encouragement and support in his power. Aided by this invaluable ally,
Adrienne succeeded in effecting a veritable revolution; the "bawlings"
which had so disgusted the Italian actor Riccoboni were heard no more,
the monotonous chant was banished, and in its place reigned "a
declamation simple, noble, and natural."[72]
The excellence of Adrienne's delivery was equalled, if not surpassed, by
her really wonderful by-play. Like Mlle. Molière, she possessed in a
very marked degree the difficult art of listening, the extreme mobility
of her features enabling her to assume at will every shade of emotion
and exhibit successively the different impressions which the words
addressed to her would naturally produce. "Perhaps no one," observes the
_Mercure_, "has ever so well understood the art of silent scenes, that
is to say, listened so well and so well expressed the sense of the words
uttered by the actor who was on the stage with her"; while Dumas
d'Aigueberre tells us that "her attitudes were noble and natural, that
she invested the movements of her arms with inimitable grace, and that
her eyes announced what she was about to say." She possessed, too, a
very rare gift--the art of concealing art, of entirely subordinating the
interpreter to the work. The dramatist Collé, a critic by no means easy
to please, it may be remarked, declares that "her treatment of every
detail of a rôle was perfect; and, in this way, caused one to forget the
actress; one saw only the personage whom she happened to be
representing." Yet another trait, and one which provoked general
admiration, was the rapidity and completeness with which she passed
from one state of mind to its exact opposite, from profound grief to
joyous gaiety, from frenzied anger to moving tenderness. "When in the
rôle of Elisabeth,"[73] says the _Mercure_, "she learned of the love of
the Comte d'Essex for the Duchess d'Irton; when, in fact, she was
delivered to the greatest scorn which a woman, and, in particular, a
queen, can endure, with what sensibility did she descend from the height
of pride to the extreme of the greatest tenderness, even so far as to
co-operate with the duchess, in order to save the count."
Brilliant _tragédienne_ though Adrienne undoubtedly was, in scenes which
called for an unusual display of passion, her acting appears to have
left a good deal to be desired, a circumstance probably attributable to
her want of physical strength. According to Collé, she "excelled in
scenes where the greatest finesse was needed rather than those which
required strength." Her acting, too, was somewhat uneven; to see her at
her best, Dumas d'Aigueberre tells us, "it was necessary for her to be
animated either by some part which pleased her or by some object of
interest." In fact, though no one had ever given such magnificent
renderings of the rôles of Monime and Bérénice, she lacked the courage
and determination which had enabled Mlle. de Champmeslé to make a
success out of the most mediocre part. The receipts of the
Comédie-Française during the early years of its existence would, we are
inclined to think, have been much less satisfactory had it fallen to
Adrienne Lecouvreur's lot to interpret the insipid heroines of Pradon
and Boyer.
The principal rôles created by Adrienne in tragedy were Cléopatre in
the _Antiochus et Cléopatre_ of Deschamps, Antigone in the _Machabées_
of La Motte, Zarès in _Esther_, Nitetis in Danchet's play of that name,
Constance in La Motte's _Inès de Castro_, and the title-part in
Voltaire's _Mariamne_.
The last-named play failed, owing to one of those little incidents so
common to the French stage of that day. At the moment when Mariamne,
condemned to death by poison, was on the point of raising the fatal cup
to her lips, a wag in the pit cried out, "_La Reine boit_," a sally
which was followed by such merriment that the indignant actors declined
to finish the play. Re-written by Voltaire, who this time prudently made
the death of the heroine take place off the stage, it reappeared a year
later, under the title of _Hérode et Mariamne_, when it had twenty-eight
representations, and when played before the Court at Fontainebleau,
moved the young Queen, Marie Leczinska, to tears.
It was during the run of _Mariamne_, in its revised form, that the
quarrel between Voltaire and the Chevalier de Rohan, second son of the
Duc de Rohan-Chabot, took place. The poet and the chevalier were with
several other persons in Adrienne's dressing-room at the theatre;
Voltaire was giving the company the benefit of his views on dramatic art
or some other subject. "Who is that young man who talks so loud?" cried
Rohan, who was in love with Adrienne and very probably jealous of the
friendship existing between her and the poet. "He is one who does not
carry about a great name, but earns respect for the name he has," was
the retort. The chevalier raised his cane threateningly; Voltaire laid
his hand upon his sword; Adrienne promptly sank down in a swoon, or,
perhaps, since she was an actress, in a pretended swoon; both gentlemen
hastened to her assistance, and the quarrel ceased. How, a few days
later, Rohan caused Voltaire to be cudgelled by his lackeys; how the
enraged poet, after taking a course of fencing lessons, challenged his
enemy to a duel, and how, in consequence, he was packed off to the
Bastille, for the second time, are incidents too well known to require
relation here.[74]