SOURCE: Lancaster, Henry Carrington. “Tragi-comedy from 1630 to 1634: Tragi-comedies by Scudéry, du Ryer, and Rotrou.” In A History of French Dramatic Literature in the Seventeenth Century. Part I: The Pre-Classical Period, 1610-1634, Volume II, pp. 472-500. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins Press, 1929.

In following excerpt, Lancaster analyzes Scudéry's tragicomedies, discussing their sources and providing original production information.

We come now to three authors who were well known in their century and have preserved a certain amount of celebrity even today, Georges de Scudéry, the soldier, Pierre Du Ryer, the scholar, and Jean Rotrou, the magistrate. Of these the last two had written plays before 1630, while Scudéry made his début probably in this year. His father belonged to a noble family of Provence, but had taken up his residence at Le Havre because of his career as an army officer and administrator. There he married and...