Aubignac, François Hédelin, abbé d'

(1604-1676)

   theatrical theorist, dramatist, critic

   François Hédelin, abbé d'Aubignac, whose studies of dramatic technique and presentation were based on the classics and had a great influence on the the 17th century and subsequently influenced 17th-century French theater, was born in Paris. A self-educated lawyer, he was ordained a priest and became the tutor to the nephew of Cardinal Richelieu. Aubignac's most noted work is his Pratique du théâtre (1657), which, while being based to an extent on Aristotle, defines verisimilitude as the essence of tragedy, and tragedy itself as a meditation on the human condition, in which the script must prevail over the action. Through the importance that he placed on the "rule of three unities," he represented the bases of classical drama. Aubignac also wrote a number of tragedies, including Cyminde (1642), La Pucelle d'Orléans (1642), and Zenobiel (1647). His Conjectures académiques sur l'Iliade (posthumous, 1715) speculates on the existence of the Greek poet Homer. This theory anticipated the work of the scholar Friederich wolf, who argued that the Iliad and the Odyssey had more than one author. After Aubignac was not invited to join the Académie Française, he founded his own society, the so-called Little Academy (1654).