Destouches

Destouches, PHILIPPE, one of the chief comic dramatists of France in the 18th century, was born in 1680. He wrote seventeen comedies, two of which, Le Philosophe Marié (1727), and Le Glorieux, his masterpiece (1732), are of a very high order of excellence. He died in 1754. His characters are truthfully drawn, and his plots interesting. In his style he imitated Boileau rather than Molière, and his verse has occasionally a happy epigrammatic turn. In his language he avoided the freedom of the older comedians, but the moral tone of his plays cannot be described as high.