NEITHER the excursion of Les Plaideurs nor the
death of the Du Parc caused Racine to deviate
for long from his more serious professional
ambitions. Andromaque had confirmed his self-
confidence and given him a strong taste for fame. There
was no measuring the heights to which, as a tragic drama-
tist, he might rise. The only doubt--since no writer,
however original, works without reference to his contem-
porary world--concerned the path which he should take
and the exact nature of the reputation to which he should
aspire.

Racine reacted, as he himself has pointed out, with ex-
treme sensitiveness to criticism. It goaded him first into
acid vindications of his own work. Later, he sometimes
recognized the validity of the objections raised and adopted
the suggestions of his critics on minor points. There was,
however, one type of criticism too general to be met by
partial refutations or to be appeased by small changes in
the published editions of his plays. It concerned the whole
writer and the total impression which his work made, and
it is best represented by the comments written by Saint-
Evremond in the summer of 1668.

It was the year of the Essay of Dramatic Poesy, the year
after the publication of Paradise Lost. As a man of wide
cultural sympathies, Saint-Evremond could hardly avoid
responding in some measure to the more serious influences
current in Restoration London. They did not clash too
violently with his own rooted preferences, formed in the

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