Scarron, Paul (1610–60), French dramatist and novelist, crippled by rheumatism at the age of 30 and forced to rely on his pen for a livelihood. He wrote a number of witty though slightly scabrous farces, of which the first two,
Jodelet; ou, Le Maître-valet (1643) and
Jodelet souffleté (1645), were produced at the
Marais with the comedian
Jodelet himself in the title-roles. In 1652 Scarron married the beautiful but penniless orphan Françoise d'Aubigné, who as Mme de
Maintenon was to become the second wife of Louis XIV and the virtual ruler of France. Meanwhile Scarron continued to write for the theatre. The best example of his burlesque comedy, in which he obtained his comic effects by ingenious word-play and by the incongruity between subject-matter and style, is
Don Japhet d'Armenié (1647), frequently revived in later years by
Molière.
L'Écolier de Salamanque (1654) is notable for the character of the valet
Crispin, long played by successive members of the
Poisson family. Scarron, whose interest in Spanish literature had led him to translate a number of Spanish plays, modernizing them and adding much material of his own, may have taken from Agustín de
Rojas the idea of his most important work
Le Roman comique (1651), a novel which depicts the adventures of an itinerant provincial theatre company. It has considerable documentary value.
