''Alexandre le Grand'' is a tragedy in 5 acts (of 3, 5, 7, 5 and 3 scenes, respectively) and verse by

Jean Racine Jean-Baptiste Racine ( , ) (; 22 December 163921 April 1699) was a French dramatist, one of the three great playwrights of 17th-century France, along with Molière and Corneille as well as an important literary figure in the Western traditi ...

. It was first produced on 4 December 1665 at the Palais Royal Theater in Paris.Date of the premiere and the venue are listed by Joseph E. Garreau, "Jean Racine" in Hochman 1984, vol. 4, p. 194. The subject of the play is the love of

Alexander the Great Alexander III of Macedon ( grc, Ἀλέξανδρος, Alexandros; 20/21 July 356 BC – 10/11 June 323 BC), commonly known as Alexander the Great, was a king of the ancient Greek kingdom of Macedon. He succeeded his father Philip II to ...

and the Indian princess Cleofile complicated by intrigues between her brother Taxilus and his ally Porus. The play is largely based on a surviving work by the Roman historian

Quintus Curtius Rufus Quintus Curtius Rufus () was a Roman historian, probably of the 1st century, author of his only known and only surviving work, ''Historiae Alexandri Magni'', "Histories of Alexander the Great", or more fully ''Historiarum Alexandri Magni Macedon ...

. Shortly after the play's opening at the Théâtre Palais Royal, Racine moved it to the more prestigious company at the Hôtel de Bourgogne, where it opened on 18 December, creating a rift with

Molière Jean-Baptiste Poquelin (, ; 15 January 1622 (baptised) – 17 February 1673), known by his stage name Molière (, , ), was a French playwright, actor, and poet, widely regarded as one of the greatest writers in the French language and world ...

Notes

References

* Hochman, Stanley, editor (1984). ''McGraw-Hill Encyclopedia of World Drama'' (second edition, 5 volumes). New York: McGraw-Hill. . Plays by Jean Racine 1665 plays Plays based on real people Plays set in ancient Greece Cultural depictions of Alexander the Great Tragedy plays Plays set in the 4th century BC {{17thC-play-stub