"In this revisionist study of the poetics of tragedy during the French classical age, John Lyons challenges prevailing notions of a coherent, unified, and widely accepted "classical doctrine." By returning to major, yet recently neglected texts, Lyons analyzes conceptions of tragedy that will surprise many readers familiar with the canonical tragedies of seventeenth-century France, tragedies sometimes wrongly assumed to have been constructed according to the precepts of a community of theorists.". "This reassessment of French classical ideas about tragedy will be valuable to students and scholars of French literature, drama, and cultural history."--BOOK JACKET.