''The Satin Slipper'' (''Le Soulier de satin'') is a long play by the French dramatist and poet

Paul Claudel Paul Claudel (; 6 August 1868 – 23 February 1955) was a French poet, dramatist and diplomat, and the younger brother of the sculptor Camille Claudel. He was most famous for his verse dramas, which often convey his devout Catholicism. Early lif ...

, written in 1929. It was first performed on stage in 1943, in a production by Claudel and

Jean-Louis Barrault Jean-Louis Bernard Barrault (; 8 September 1910 – 22 January 1994) was a French actor, director and mime artist who worked on both screen and stage. Biography Barrault was born in Le Vésinet in France in 1910. His father was 'a Burgundia ...

. Its run time is roughly eleven hours. Nowadays it is rarely staged, because of its extreme length and its challenging production requirements. It was made into a film in 1985 by the Portuguese director Manoel de Oliveira.

Plot summary

The scene is set during the

Renaissance The Renaissance ( , ) , from , with the same meanings. is a period in European history The history of Europe is traditionally divided into four time periods: prehistoric Europe (prior to about 800 BC), classical antiquity (800 BC to AD ...

at the time of the

conquistadors Conquistadors (, ) or conquistadores (, ; meaning 'conquerors') were the explorer-soldiers of the Spanish and Portuguese Empires of the 15th and 16th centuries. During the Age of Discovery, conquistadors sailed beyond Europe to the Americas, ...

. The play is a love story dominated by the ideas of sin and redemption and the various characters, some divine and some comic, frequently engage in a dialogue as though between Heaven and Earth.

Productions

Full-length productions were staged in Paris and the

Avignon Festival The ''Festival d'Avignon'', or Avignon Festival, is an annual arts festival held in the French city of Avignon every summer in July in the courtyard of the Palais des Papes as well as in other locations of the city. Founded in 1947 by Jean Vila ...

and most recently by

Olivier Py Olivier Py (; born 24 July 1965 in Grasse, Alpes-Maritimes) is a French stage director, actor and writer. Career In 1997, Py became director of the Centre dramatique national d'Orléans. In 2007, he became director of the Théâtre de l'Odéon ...

at the Théâtre de l'Odéon in Paris in 2009.

References

* Edition critique : ''Le Soulier de satin'' by Paul Claudel, Antoinette Weber-Caflisch, Annales littéraires de l'Université de Besançon, n° 334, Les Belles Lettres, 1987.

External links

French plays 1929 plays 1943 plays {{1920s-play-stub

Plot summary

Productions

See also

References

External links