Reading response on Moliere's Tartuffe acts three and four

Moliere Tartuffe Acts III-IV

The third and fourth acts of Moliere's comedy Tartuffe raise the drama to a climactic confrontation which resolves in an unexpected direction at the end of Act III, allowing for a new twist in the final act. The third act centers around the actual introduction of Tartuffe -- whom we have heard described from the play's opening but have not yet met. His entrance does not disappoint, filled with lofty religious musings and a willingness to call attention to Dorine's bosom while pretending that it summons in him impure thoughts. Elmire, meanwhile, is planning to use her influence with Tartuffe in order to cancel his ludicrous plan to marry Mariane (in order to get her money). Elmire's private meeting with Tartuffe, and Act III Scene iii of Moliere's Tartuffe is, to a certain extent, the moment that the audience has been waiting for from the beginning -- the religious hypocrisy of the title character finally slips, the fondness he shows towards Elmire is now revealed for what it is -- lust -- and he makes a sudden move to seduce Elmire (whom he wrongly interprets as flirting with him). The shock of Tartuffe's sudden lechery must have an obvious effect on the audience -- on the one hand, depending upon how the moment is staged, the audience might feel they are witnessing a potential rape, on the other hand it is clearly comic. But in any case, the audience knows -- as Tartuffe does not -- that Damis is hiding in the closet, so our anxieties for Elmire's safety are allayed. After Damis emerges in III.iv and announces he will tell Orgon what he has witnessed, we have a full expectation that the religious hypocrite will finally be exposed. After all, he has just exposed himself (on the hopes of exposing Elmire's naked body in the process).

The cleverest thing about Moliere's comic construction here is that III.v (through the end of the act) is the scene that could and should, ostensibly, end the play. With eyewitness testimony, surely Orgon cannot fail to see the truth of Tartuffe's nature? Yet Tartuffe, proving the truth of the old saw that the devil can indeed quote Scripture to his purpose, manages to turn the tables on Damis, and paint himself as the innocent victim of slander in a hilariously slick parody of piety. He will even confess himself to be

A wretched sinner, all depraved and twisted,

The greatest villain that has ever existed

But even Tartuffe's confession of wickedness sounds absolutely insincere. "Are you so hoodwinked by this rascal's art?" Damis asks, incredulous. But apparently Orgon is, and Damis is thrown out and disinherited. The audience's expectation is subverted so completely by Orgon's being persuaded by Tartuffe at this point, that we can barely imagine a denoument -- save for the fact that Tartuffe's sublime effrontery here is so amusing, that viewers might have the expectation that the dramatist will raise his comic villain to a final height, the better from which to see him come crashing down.

Unexpectedly, but somehow perfectly, Moliere chooses to depict Tartuffe's fall -- and the revelation of his true nature -- in exactly the same fashion as the failed attempt in Act III. Rather than Elmire hiding Damis in the closet, she places the stubbornly obtuse Orgon under a table, and then speaks with Tartuffe who is now more obviously bent on rape than he was in the earlier scene. Elmire has told Orgon to emerge if she is in risk, but he never does -- so she tells Tartuffe that she will satisfy him if he makes sure her husband is nowhere to be found. Then -- in a huge laugh of relief in recognizing what has just been averted -- Orgon does emerge and Elmire upbraids him for not intervening. (If he wanted proof the man was a hypocrite who desired her sexually, she notes, there could have been some very convincing proof if he had continued to wait.) But then Moliere manages to subvert expectation and raise the stakes again -- even this outright proof of his real nature does not stop Tartuffe, who now threatens to punish Orgon for defying him. Tartuffe's solidification of his position is even more secure as Act IV closes than it had been at the end of Act III, despite the fact that Orgon gets undeniable proof in Act IV. It is too late, since Orgon has already willed his property over to the religious con-man, although the act closes not with Tartuffe triumphant but with a slight hint from Orgon that there may be one way to stop Tartuffe. But the dramatic structure in these two acts is the real marvel -- Moliere manages to pull off the same trick (of exposing Tartuffe, allowing him to make his best defense, and showing him victorious) twice in a row. Each time raises the stakes, and each time subverts our expectation (or hope) that Tartuffe will fall. Act IV has to close on Orgon revealing that there may be one last option remaining because to some extent Tartuffe's success in remaining in place here has gone from ludicrous in Act III to somewhat sinister by the end of Act IV. The audience needs to know that he will fall: otherwise, this looks like the slow rise to power of a hypocritically religious despot.