Le Philosophe sans le savoir by Michel-Jean Sedaine

In May 1760 the Comédie-Française performed a play by Charles Palissot de Montenoy entitled Les Philosophes (The Philosophes), an attack on the group of writers known by that name. In the audience was Michel-Jean Sedaine, who, although not a member of the group himself, was sufficiently shocked by this attack on serious authors and thinkers to decide that he should write a reply to Palissot’s work. At least in part because the use of the controversial subject of duelling on which the plot is centred caused problems with the censors, Le Philosophe sans le savoir did not reach the stage until 1765, but, when it was at last performed, it proved to be a great success. Although Sedaine usually wrote libretti for operas-comiques, for his new play he chose a genre pioneered by Diderot, one of the writers attacked in Les Philosophes, the drame. Sedaine’s play has been generally recognized as the masterpiece of this short-lived genre. As well as looking at the play itself, the introduction to this translation examines its place in the literary controversy sparked by Palissot’s play, and the origins and development of the drame.