Montherlant, Henri de (1896–1972), French writer, known chiefly for his novels until in 1942 the success of his first play,
La Reine morte (based on the story of Inés de Castro), at the
Comédie-Française turned his thoughts seriously to the theatre. Three more plays were produced at the Comédie-Française—
Port Royal (1954),
Brocéliande (1956), and
Le Cardinal d'Espagne (1960). His other plays include
Le Maître de Santiago (1948), about the struggle between love and religion,
Celles qu'on prend dans ses bras (1950), about sexual obsession,
Malatesta (also 1950), and
Don Juan (1958). The most interesting,
La Ville dont le prince est un enfant, was written in 1951 but not performed until 1967. It deals with a platonic friendship between two boys which is destroyed by a priest not, as he thinks, out of kindness but out of jealousy. This portrayal of spiritual agony, of the conflict between love and religion, is typical of Montherlant's plays, which contain little external action and are written in a sonorous prose that makes few concessions to realism. Although they have a religious context, Montherlant did not consider himself a ‘Catholic’ writer, preferring to describe himself as a ‘psychological’ dramatist. His plays have had little success in English, though in 1957 Donald
Wolfit appeared in
The Master of Santiago and
Malatesta.
