Monkey and Tartuffe

Moliere Tartuffe

Monkey"-ing Around with Appearance and Reality -- the False Face of Moliere's Pious Hypocrite "Tartuffe" and the True Heart of the "Monkey"

Both Moliere's "Tartuffe" and the Chinese play "Monkey" revolve around the drama of potential marital relationships gone awry because of the failure of one of the partners to see the truth about another individual's fundamental character. In Moliere's "Tartuffe," for example, the aspiring bourgeois gentleman Orgon pays host to the supposedly religious man "Tartuffe," in hopes of securing his place in society and eventually (although perhaps less importantly) in heaven. What is obvious to all members of Orgon's household, however, except Orgon himself, is that Tartuffe is nothing like a true man of God. Rather Tartuffe is merely a dissembler who lusts after his patron's wife with an entirely irreligious force of passion and eats Orgon's meat and drinks his wine, all the while counseling Orgon to pray for his sins. When the maid of the house hears about his designs upon her mistress, Dorine constructs a plot to expose Tartuffe. Thus she functions as the kind of 'monkey' of the Moliere satire. Dorine and the other women of the tale function as one of the socially underestimated creatures who engineer a plot to expose the threat offered by the unexposed evil man, to the main female characters. In Moliere's social satire of class "Tartuffe," characters are under or over estimated because of their social class. In contrast, in the more mythically designed play "Monkey" they are over or underestimated by their appearances of strength and prowess.

Mr. Kao doubts the titular "Monkey" of the Chinese play because of the monkey's appearance. Mr. Kao doubts that such a "frightful creature" as the money can catch the kind of powerful monster who ensnared the heart of the Kao daughter.

A dissembler has married Kao's daughter, and thus she essentially suffers the threatened but unrealized fate of Moliere's Marianne. Tartuffe merely expresses his designs on the young woman, but in "Monkey" the girl is actively spirited away. The girl of "Monkey" has become confused between the appearance and the reality of her suitor's nature, although Moliere's Marianne wishes to marry a man of true heart, and only her father is confused about Tartuffe. In reply to Mr. Kao, Monkey says, "if you judge people by their appearance, you'll always be going wrong," much as the man's daughter went wrong in her marital alliance. (34)

Thus, Mr. Kao nearly commits the same error as his daughter in regards to appearances. The girl Kao misjudges her potential husband, as does her father the monkey who must save her. But they may be excused, as physical appearances are far more permeable in "Monkey" than in "Tartuffe." True, a foolish father figure also dominates the Moliere play. However, Orgon does not simply distrust his good loyal servants and wife on the words of Tartuffe. Orgon fundamentally mistrusts himself and his own status in the world, and the very obvious hypocrisy of the sponging religious hypocrite who takes advantage of his wealth. Because Orgon is an aspirant to social status, who wants to make good in a society that does not like self-made men, but only aristocrats to the manner born, Orgon trusts in Tartuffe's image of pious hypocrisy and sage advice in a way that defies what is obvious.

Unlike the physical transformation of "Monkey," the characters of Moliere do not wear masks of appearances, but masks of social or moral respectability. Orgon does not fully understand how false Tartuffe is, hoping that by buying Tartuffe's favor he can both buy his way to heaven and buy social cache as a religious man of wisdom and intellect. When Orgon says with approval that he sees that Tartuffe reproves everything, takes extreme care of Orgon's honor, because Tartuffe warns Orgon of the people who cast loving eyes upon the lady, the audience can only laugh at Orgon's pride that Tartuffe more jealous of his wife than her own husband, and the lengths to which Tartuffe carries his pious zeal, accusing himself of sin for the slightest thing imaginable. The audience laughs because when Orgon protests that a mere trifle is enough to shock Tartuffe, the outsider understands that Orgon's lack of a sense of true self-worth is being taken advantage of -- the more he is criticized, and the more he is seen in his own eyes as lacking in relation to Tartuffe, the more Orgon approves of the person who is doing the critiquing! In contrast, Orgon undervalues Dorine the maid, a genuinely good woman of no status, who wishes to protect her wise and moral mistress and is truly clever and full of spirit.

Even Mr. Rao of "Monkey" lacks the extreme self-abasement of Orgon, and thus is not quite as easily deceived by transparent and put-upon appearances. While one might excuse Rao's unwillingness to trust one's daughter's fate to a monkey, Orgon is willing to marry Tartuffe to his young, lovely, and kindly daughter Marianne against her will simply because Tartuffe instructs him to do so. The only reason that Orgon blames the suitors of Orgon's daughter Marianne, and is so jealous of Orgon's wife is that Tartuffe wants to marry the girl to insinuate himself in the family, and to make love to Orgon's wife.

Of course, both plays show that expertise is no guarantee of moral truth. The "Monkey" does save the girl, and Orgon's brother Cleante who is from the same social class, reproves Orgon when Orgon states that Tartuffe "weans / My heart from every friendship, teaches me / to have no love for anything on earth; / and I could see my brother, children, mother / and wife, all die, and never care -- a snap." (I.IV.20)