17th Weapons Squadron, History, 17th Tactical Fighter Squadron
In 1985 the squadron was upgraded to the Block 25 F-16C from the General Dynamics factory in Fort Worth. These aircraft were more capable in comparison with the former block 15 models. Also new weapon systems could now be introduced, like the CBU-87 Combined Effects Munition.


17th Weapons Squadron, History, 17th Tactical Fighter Squadron
After the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in August 1990, the 24 aircraft of the 17th were deployed to Al Dhafra Air Base, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates on 9 August 1990 and started flying air defense missions over the Saudi kingdom as part of Operation Desert Shield. When Operation Desert Storm started in January 1991 the squadron was at the forefront of air operations.


17th Weapons Squadron, History, 17th Tactical Fighter Squadron
Upon their return to the United States, in March 1991, the squadron started receiving some brand-new block 42 F-16s. Their primary mission of air interdiction remained the same. During 1993 the first rumors came that the entire wing was to be disbanded. The news was quickly acknowledged. On 31 December 1993 the squadron was inactivated in favor of squadrons from the senior 20th Fighter Wing, which was moving from the closed RAF Upper Heyford, England to Shaw as part of the USAFE drawdown at the end of the Cold War. The squadron transferred its aircraft and personnel to the 20th, and the 363d Wing was inactivated.


17th Weapons Squadron, References, Bibliography
This article incorporates public domain material from the Air Force Historical Research Agency website .


17th West Virginia Infantry Regiment
The 17th West Virginia Infantry Regiment was an infantry regiment that served in the Union Army during the American Civil War.


17th West Virginia Infantry Regiment, Service
The 17th West Virginia Infantry Regiment was organized at Wheeling in West Virginia between 26 September 1864 and 25 February 1865, and was mustered out on 30 June 1865.


17th West Virginia Infantry Regiment, Casualties
The 17th West Virginia Infantry Regiment suffered one enlisted men killed or mortally wounded in battle and 24 enlisted men dead from disease for a total of 25 fatalities.


17th West Virginia Infantry Regiment, Casualties
President Joseph Robinette Biden's great-grandfather, Pvt. George Hamilton Robinette, served in the Regiment in 1864 and 1865.


17th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment
The 17th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment was an infantry regiment that served in the Union Army during the American Civil War. It was popularly known as the Irish Brigade, due to its composition of mostly Irish American immigrants.


17th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment, Establishment
The 17th Wisconsin Infantry was organized under the authority granted by the July 22, 1861, act of Congress approving the enrollment of 500,000 volunteers for service in the American Civil War.


17th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment, Establishment
In October 1861, Governor Alexander Randall appointed John L. Doran colonel of the 17th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment, and tasked him with organizing the new regiment. From its inception, the 17th Wisconsin Infantry was recruited principally from the Irish population of the state.


17th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment, Establishment
Recruiting continued through the Winter and the regiment was collected and drilled at Camp Randall in Madison, Wisconsin. They mustered into federal service under Colonel Doran on March 15, 1862, and left the state for Saint Louis, Missouri, on March 23.


17th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment, Service, Operations around Corinth (Spring 1862 – Fall 1862)
The regiment proceeded from Saint Louis, on April 10, up the Tennessee River to Pittsburg Landing, Tennessee, where they were assigned to the 6th division of the Army of the Tennessee and moved with the army to invest the Siege of Corinth. During the siege, Colonel Dornan was placed in command of the brigade—which also comprised the 16th Wisconsin, 21st Missouri, and 25th Missouri infantry regiments—but was replaced on May 24 by Brigadier General John McArthur.


17th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment, Service, Operations around Corinth (Spring 1862 – Fall 1862)
The Union Army took control of the town on May 29, but the 17th Wisconsin suffered significantly from diseases during the siege. The regiment remained camped south of Corinth through the summer and was then engaged in defense of railroad and logistics in the area. Company A was detached from the regiment and posted several miles out on the Mobile and Ohio Railroad and would not rejoin the regiment until November.


17th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment, Service, Operations around Corinth (Spring 1862 – Fall 1862)
Around October 1, Company A, under Captain McCauley, engaged in a skirmish with Confederate cavalry north of Corinth while guarding the Mobile and Ohio Railroad. Company A suffered thirteen killed or wounded, but managed to drive off the Confederate regiment and captured a number of horses.


17th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment, Service, Operations around Corinth (Spring 1862 – Fall 1862)
On the morning of the first day of the Second Battle of Corinth, October 3, 1862, the brigade of the 17th Wisconsin Infantry was placed on the Chewalla Road north of Corinth on the left end of the Union line. In the late morning, the Union line was being driven back, but a counterattack was ordered. As the Confederates attempted to outflank the counterattack, Colonel Doran led the 17th Wisconsin Infantry in a valiant charge on the Confederate lines and drove back the enemy regiments. They then fell back with their division to defensive lines nearer to Corinth.


17th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment, Service, Operations around Corinth (Spring 1862 – Fall 1862)
On the second day of battle, the 17th Wisconsin was engaged in the defense of an artillery battery and did not see significant fighting. The actions of the 17th Wisconsin and their commander on October 3 were highly complimented in the accounts of the battle written by generals Thomas J. McKean and John McArthur. In the battle, the 17th Wisconsin Infantry suffered five killed and 20 wounded.


17th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment, Service, Vicksburg campaign (Winter 1862 – Summer 1863)
Grant's Vicksburg campaign launched in November 1862, and the 17th Wisconsin Infantry was transferred to the 2nd brigade, commanded by Col. Gabriel Bouck.


17th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment, Service, Vicksburg campaign (Winter 1862 – Summer 1863)
On November 25, however, Colonel Doran resigned and was placed under arrest by General John McArthur. Lt . Colonel Adam Gale Malloy was promoted to colonel and led the regiment through most of the rest of the war.


17th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment, Service, Vicksburg campaign (Winter 1862 – Summer 1863)
Under Malloy's command, the regiment arrived in the vicinity of Vicksburg in January 1863, and were assigned to the digging of a canal to bypass Confederate defenses around Vicksburg. They remained until April 20, when they were sent further south, below Vicksburg. They were attached to the XVII Corps, commanded by General James B. McPherson, and proceeded to Raymond, Mississippi, arriving on May 16. Here they received word of the Battle of Champion Hill and were ordered to rush to the battle site, but did not arrive until the battle was over.


17th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment, Service, Vicksburg campaign (Winter 1862 – Summer 1863)
From there, they turned back to the Siege of Vicksburg and secured a position southeast of the city. On May 19, 1863, they were in the vanguard of the assault against the Confederate fortifications and managed to capture a portion of the enemy trenches. The rest of their brigade, however, did not receive the signal to attack—left without support, the 17th Wisconsin was forced to withdraw. On the second attempted assault, May 22, the 17th Wisconsin was held in reserve, due to their severe losses on the first assault.


17th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment, Service, Vicksburg campaign (Winter 1862 – Summer 1863)
After the failure of the second assault, Grant settled in for a protracted siege and maintained the encirclement until Vicksburg surrendered on July 4, 1863. The brigade of the 17th Wisconsin, then led by General Thomas E. G. Ransom, was given the honor of being the first to enter the city, due to their performance in the siege. In the Vicksburg campaign, the 17th Wisconsin Infantry suffered 14 killed and 50 wounded.


17th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment, Service, Operations West of the Mississippi (Fall 1863)
A few days after the capture of Vicksburg, the 17th Wisconsin and its brigade moved south to Natchez, Mississippi. There on August 24, they were supplied with horses and employed as mounted infantry. In September, Colonel Malloy led 300 men of the 17th Wisconsin across the Mississippi River to Trinity, Louisiana, routing Confederate defenders and destroyed a Confederate steamboat—the Rinaldo—carrying supplies.


17th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment, Service, Operations West of the Mississippi (Fall 1863)
After being joined by the rest of the brigade, Malloy and the 17th Wisconsin were again sent forward and occupied the town of Trinity, then went forward again and routed more Confederate defenders, pursued them for nine miles, and captured several prisoners. During this campaign, the 17th Wisconsin suffered one killed and four wounded.


17th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment, Service, Operations West of the Mississippi (Fall 1863)
On September 4, they approached Fort Beauregard, a fortified earthwork designed to defend approaches to Harrisonburg, Louisiana. The Confederate defenders fled and abandoned the fort and its guns, and the 17th Wisconsin Infantry captured and destroyed several cannons and ammunition. After this success, they went on to destroy a grist mill and a large store of cotton and food supplies, then returned to with the brigade to Natchez. Colonel Malloy's account of the Natchez expedition can be found in the Official War Records, Series 1, Volume 26, Part 1.


17th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment, Service, Atlanta campaign (Spring – Summer 1864)
Seven-eighths of the regiment re-enlisted in January 1864, qualifying the 17th Wisconsin Infantry as a veteran regiment. The veterans were given furlough in March to return to Wisconsin, where they paraded through Madison and were honored by Governor James T. Lewis, Secretary of State (General) Lucius Fairchild, and Mayor William T. Leitch.


17th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment, Service, Atlanta campaign (Spring – Summer 1864)
The regiment reassembled on April 20, 1864, at Camp Washburn, Milwaukee, and went by rail to Cairo, Illinois. There they attached to XVII Corps, which was on its way to join General William T. Sherman in the Atlanta campaign. They traveled on the Tennessee River to Clifton, Tennessee, then marched to Huntsville, Alabama. At Huntsville, in May 1864, the 17th Wisconsin Infantry was assigned to the 3rd brigade, 3rd division, XVII Corps, and Colonel Malloy was designated brigade commander, leaving Lt. Colonel Thomas McMahon in command of the regiment.


17th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment, Service, Atlanta campaign (Spring – Summer 1864)
On June 5, the 17th Wisconsin, with its division, marched to join General Sherman, meeting him at Acworth, Georgia, on June 8, just after the Battle of Dallas. Their division was placed on the far left end of the Union line, near Big Shanty, on June 10, and engaged in heavy skirmishing until June 19, when they advanced to Brush Mountain, suffering two killed and six wounded.


17th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment, Service, Atlanta campaign (Spring – Summer 1864)
At the Battle of Kennesaw Mountain, where the Confederate army of Joseph E. Johnston had set its defenses, the 17th Wisconsin and its division were again on the far left of the Union line. They were part of the demonstration against the Confederate right, designed to convince the enemy to spread out their defenses. The 17th Wisconsin succeeded in taking two lines of Confederate trenches, but came under fire from three Confederate batteries; they held the ground for three hours but were forced to withdraw. They suffered 2 killed and 11 wounded here. After several days of stalemate, in which they suffered an additional 1 killed and 3 wounded, on July 2, the 17th Wisconsin, with its corps, was assigned to the flanking maneuver which went around the south end of the Confederate line and forced Johnston to evacuate his position.


17th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment, Service, Atlanta campaign (Spring – Summer 1864)
They crossed the Chattahoochee River with their division on July 17, and marched around the north of Atlanta, arriving at Decatur, Georgia, on July 20. The division then marched west toward Atlanta, and seized a Confederate position on Bald Hill on July 21, while the 17th Wisconsin was in reserve. The 17th Wisconsin and its brigade then joined their division and fortified the hill, which was near the center of the Union line.


17th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment, Service, Atlanta campaign (Spring – Summer 1864)
As the Union left fell back after skirmishes that day, Bald Hill was near the pivot of the L-shaped Union line in the Battle of Atlanta, July 22. During the battle, the hill came under assault from Carter L. Stevenson's division, but the division held their ground. The 17th Wisconsin suffered 4 killed and 11 wounded.


17th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment, Service, Atlanta campaign (Spring – Summer 1864)
On August 24, Lieutenant Colonel McMahan was discharged, and Major Donald D. Scott was promoted to lieutenant colonel, taking over as the acting commander of the 17th Wisconsin Infantry.


17th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment, Service, Atlanta campaign (Spring – Summer 1864)
The 17th Wisconsin, with XVII Corps, maintained the siege of Atlanta until August 26, when they moved to the south of the city to cut the last remaining supply lines for the Confederate defenders. XVII Corps was in reserve during the Battle of Jonesboro, but after the Confederate evacuation of Atlanta, the 17th Wisconsin engaged in skirmishing around Lovejoy Station, suffering 11 killed.


17th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment, Service, Savannah and the Carolinas (Fall 1864 – Spring 1865)
The 17th Wisconsin briefly participated in pursuit of the Confederate army after they abandoned Atlanta, but returned to Marietta, then camped in that area with XVII Corps until November 16, when General Sherman began his famous march to the sea (Savannah campaign). The 17th Wisconsin went with the column along the southern route to Savannah, Georgia, and did not engage in fighting during the march.


17th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment, Service, Savannah and the Carolinas (Fall 1864 – Spring 1865)
Their commanders, Colonel Malloy and Lt. Colonel Scott, were on furlough when the march began and while on their way back, they were diverted to command a provisional brigade through other operations in Tennessee and Alabama. They did not rejoin the army until their provisional division merged back with Sherman's army at Goldsboro, North Carolina, on March 23, 1865.


17th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment, Service, Savannah and the Carolinas (Fall 1864 – Spring 1865)
The 17th Wisconsin, meanwhile, was under the command of Major Patrick H. McCauley, and continued with Sherman in his Campaign of the Carolinas, leaving Savannah in January 1865. They camped near Beaufort, South Carolina, then marched with their Corps to the vicinity of Columbia, South Carolina. At the Battle of Rivers' Bridge, their brigade was part of the rapid crossing which forced the enemy to evacuate their defensive position. They then held the bridge until the remainder of their force could arrive and cross.


17th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment, Service, Savannah and the Carolinas (Fall 1864 – Spring 1865)
They proceeded to North Carolina, arriving at Goldsboro on March 23. There, Colonel Malloy resumed command of the 17th Wisconsin Infantry. They joined the march to Raleigh, North Carolina. While there, they received word of the surrender of Confederate general Joseph E. Johnston's army and Robert E. Lee's surrender to Grant in Virginia around the same time; the war was effectively over. They marched to the Confederate capitol, Richmond, Virginia, then proceeded to Washington, D.C., where they participated in the Grand Review of the Armies.


17th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment, Service, Savannah and the Carolinas (Fall 1864 – Spring 1865)
The regiment was sent to Louisville, Kentucky, and mustered out. Then returned to Madison, Wisconsin, on July 17, where the regiment was paid and disbanded.


17th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment, Service, Savannah and the Carolinas (Fall 1864 – Spring 1865)
For meritorious services during the war, Col. Malloy was brevetted Brigadier General.


17th Wisconsin Infantry Regiment, Casualties
The 17th Wisconsin Infantry suffered 41 men killed in action or died of wounds, plus another 220 who died of disease, and 14 who died in accidents, for a total of 275 fatalities.


17th Wisconsin Legislature
The Seventeenth Wisconsin Legislature convened from January 13, 1864, to April 4, 1864, in regular session.


17th Wisconsin Legislature
Senators representing odd-numbered districts were newly elected for this session and were serving the first year of a two-year term. Assembly members were elected to a one-year term. Assembly members and odd-numbered senators were elected in the general election of November 3, 1863. Senators representing even-numbered districts were serving the second year of their two-year term, having been elected in the general election held on November 4, 1862.


17th Wisconsin Legislature, Members, Senate
Members of the Wisconsin Senate for the Seventeenth Wisconsin Legislature:


17th World Festival of Youth and Students
The 17th World Festival of Youth and Students (WFYS) was an event that was opened on December 13, 2010 in the South African capital of Pretoria and was organized by the World Federation of Democratic Youth (WFDY). The festival attracted 15,000 people from close to 130 countries and was held under the slogan, "Let's Defeat Imperialism, for a World of Peace, Solidarity and Social Transformation!". It was the second time that an edition of the WFYS has been held in Africa, with the other being in Algeria in 2001


17th World Festival of Youth and Students
Some media reported that the festival organisers originally claimed that the festival would cost R370 million, but in reality the festival was organised by the National Youth Development Agency (NYDA), whose annual budget was R370 million at the time. The organisers were able to secure R69 million of funding, even after a gift from the South African National Lottery of R40 million. The true cost of the festival was later revealed to have been around R100 million. This included R24,5 million for travel and accommodation, R29,9 million for catering, and R9,4 million for entertainment.


17th World Festival of Youth and Students
Delegates were originally going to be housed at Nasrec in Johannesburg, and transported daily to the festival venue in Pretoria 80 km away, but given the shortage of funds the organisers eventually relented and housed the delegates at the Tshwane University in Pretoria, saving itself R100 million in the process. The National Lottery gift caused an outcry in South Africa, and the festival was called a "bash" and an "expensive jamboree" by critics.


17th World Festival of Youth and Students
The opening ceremony was held at the Moses Moripe Stadium in Pretoria, and delegates were addressed by among others the then-president of South Africa, Jacob Zuma, whose speech focused on the value of education as a solution for the world's problems. A procession of delegations in national costume, chanting and carrying posters and banners also marched around the stadium. Some of the activities included discussion groups about various topics, concerts in the evenings, and group visits to monuments. There was a daily festival newsletter called Festival News. The bulk of the activities took place at the Tshwane Events Centre. There were 19 sessions every day (seminars, workshops and conferences).


17th World Festival of Youth and Students
On one of the days, the proceedings were interrupted by hundreds of COPE members arriving in buses who believed that part of the venue was reserved for a conference of their own. They eventually left again. During the first three days of the festival, there were complaints of disorganisation, lack of communiation and food not being provided. Some catering companies refused to serve meals, claiming that organisers have refused to pay invoices amounting to millions of rands. A number prominent speakers did not arrive.


17th World Science Fiction Convention
The 17th World Science Fiction Convention, also known as Detention, was held September 4–7, 1959, at the Pick Fort Shelby Hotel in Detroit, Michigan, United States.


17th World Science Fiction Convention
The chairmen were Roger Sims and Fred Prophet. The guests of honor were Poul Anderson (pro) and John Berry (fan). The toastmaster was Isaac Asimov "...with the assistance of Robert Bloch". Total attendance was 371.


17th World Science Fiction Convention, Awards
The Hugo Awards, named after Hugo Gernsback, are presented every year for the best science fiction or fantasy works and achievements of the previous year. The results are based on the ballots submitted by members of the World Science Fiction Society. Other awards, including the Astounding Award for Best New Writer (since 1973; named "John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer" until 2019), are also presented at each year's Worldcon.


17th World Scout Jamboree
The 17th World Scout Jamboree (Korean: 제17회 세계잼버리) was held August 8 to 16, 1991 and was hosted by South Korea at Seoraksan National Park, near the border with North Korea, and some 200 km, six hours by road, from Seoul.


17th World Scout Jamboree
Many Lands, One World was the theme, which brought together approximately 20,000 Scouts from 135 countries and territories, and in particular, Eastern European nations, as all the formerly communist states of Central and Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union were developing Scouting in the months preceding the dissolution of the Soviet Union. Scouts from Czechoslovakia and Hungary participated as members of the World Scout Movement for the first time since 1947. Bulgaria, Belarus, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Russia, Ukraine and Yugoslavia each fielded contingents.


17th World Scout Jamboree
The Jamboree started with bad weather, with rain and flooding providing major problems. The opening and closing ceremonies were designed to rival those of the 1988 Summer Olympics. The Jamboree sported the first Global Development Village program, and was visited by Korean president Roh Tae-woo, Carl XVI Gustaf of Sweden and Prince Moulay Rachid of Morocco.


17th World Scout Jamboree
The British contingent transported a replica Brownsea Island Scout camp to re-enact Robert Baden-Powell, 1st Baron Baden-Powell's 1907 experiment in Scouting. It became the most photographed and filmed event at the Jamboree.


17th World Scout Jamboree
Scouts also experienced home hospitality in South Korea and Japan.


17th Writers Guild of America Awards
The 17th Writers Guild of America Awards honored the best film writers and television writers of 1964. Winners were announced in 1965.


17th Yokohama Film Festival
The 17th Yokohama Film Festival (第17回ヨコハマ映画祭) was held on 4 February 1996 in Kannai Hall, Yokohama, Kanagawa, Japan.


17th Youth in Film Awards
The 17th Youth in Film Awards ceremony (now known as the Young Artist Awards), presented by the Youth in Film Association, honored outstanding youth performers under the age of 21 in the fields of film, television and music for the 1994–1995 season, and took place in 1996 in Hollywood, California.


17th Youth in Film Awards
Established organization to establish an awards ceremony specifically set to recognize and award the contributions of performers under the age of 21 in the fields of film, television, theater and music.


17th Youth in Film Awards, Best Young Performer in a Feature Film, Best Young Leading Actress: Feature Film
★ Anna Chlumsky – Gold Diggers: The Secret of Bear Mountain


17th Youth in Film Awards, Youth In Film's Special Awards, The Michael Landon Award, Outstanding Contribution to Youth Through Television
★ Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman – For Outstanding Family Television Series of the Year


17th Youth in Film Awards, Youth In Film's Special Awards, Outstanding Contribution To Youth Through Entertainment
★ World Youth News – Kris Kollins and Mick Kollins


17th Youth in Film Awards, Youth In Film's Special Awards, Outstanding Contribution To Youth Through Entertainment
The power of video for kids is a message Mick and Kris Kollins want to get out to youth everywhere as well. After this father-and-son team saw studies showing that kids didn't like what they saw on the news—they felt all the stories were depressing and downbeat—they decided to create "World Youth News," a news program about kids, by kids from around the world.


17th Youth in Film Awards, Youth In Film's Special Awards, Outstanding Contribution To Youth Through Entertainment
Calling All ShootersThe first step in a process that has already put six episodes of "World Youth News" on the air was to contact schools around the world and ask them to put up "Help Wanted" flyers on job bulletin boards. The resulting response has been incredible. And it's easy to see why: "World Youth News" pays 250 dollars for each story they use. According to Mick, that's no small potatoes in some countries.


17th Youth in Film Awards, Youth In Film's Special Awards, Outstanding Contribution To Youth Through Entertainment
"In Eastern Europe, for instance, an adult male takes home the equivalent of about 150 US dollars a month. And that's considered a good salary. Now you get his kid who comes up with a story, videotapes it and sends it to us and we use it, that kid's got 250 US dollars. Let me tell you, that kid is suddenly a real hero."


17th Youth in Film Awards, Youth In Film's Special Awards, Outstanding Contribution To Youth Through Entertainment
"It gives them a real sense of purpose and legitimacy," says Kris. "We make ID cards for them—press badges. Some of our kids have used those press badges to get into political rallies and things like that."


17th Youth in Film Awards, Youth In Film's Special Awards, Outstanding Contribution To Youth Through Entertainment
Gaining ExposureAs of right now, "World Youth News" is on two different cable networks three times a week. Combined totals from both networks means WYN (pronounced "win") is currently in about 22 million homes. And that's just in the United States. European interest has been gaining steadily—20 countries are currently in negotiation. One, Saudi Arabia, has already placed an order for 26 episodes.


17th Youth in Film Awards, Youth In Film's Special Awards, Outstanding Contribution To Youth Through Entertainment
Success, however, has not been easy. "When we first finished the pilot, we took it to a lot of people and they simply didn't know what to do with it. It wasn't like anything they had seen before. It wasn't exactly a news show and it wasn't exactly some kind of entertainment. It was infotainment."


17th Youth in Film Awards, Youth In Film's Special Awards, Outstanding Contribution To Youth Through Entertainment
Still, Mick and Kris knew they were on to something. Says Mick: "The teen market is the largest market in the world, end of story. Last year, American teens, which number about 30 million, spent 57 billion dollars of their own money."


17th Youth in Film Awards, Youth In Film's Special Awards, Outstanding Contribution To Youth Through Entertainment
Says Kris: "Besides that, they are the most accessible group—the easiest to talk to. We've got it so they're the ones who are doing the shooting and they're the ones who are digesting that same information. We don't see a lot of good things for teens and we really wanted this to be one of the good things."


17th Youth in Film Awards, Youth In Film's Special Awards, Outstanding Contribution To Youth Through Entertainment
Making PlansBut "World Youth News" is only part of their plan. As they expand, their intention is to create the World Youth Network.


17th Youth in Film Awards, Youth In Film's Special Awards, Outstanding Contribution To Youth Through Entertainment
"Right now," Mick says, "we have a mini-CNN in place. We've got shooters all over the world who are sending us stories and whom we can contact to go and get a story for us. Our ultimate goal, however, is to expand into the on-line arena and become a complete on-line service. That way, people can send their videos to us straight into our computers and the users out there can have direct access to that same information. We want to provide a service where the user can become a participant."


17th Youth in Film Awards, Youth In Film's Special Awards, Outstanding Contribution To Youth Through Entertainment
"Besides," says Kris, "we've got a lot of footage that people have sent to us that we haven't been able to use yet, and we're in the process of archiving it. When we're finished, we'll have this incredible library of footage that, with the right software, people from anywhere in the world will be able to look at, just as if they're going to the library."


17th Youth in Film Awards, Youth In Film's Special Awards, Outstanding Contribution To Youth Through Entertainment
Direct work with the kids who shoot for them has already been happening. In one case, they received three different tapes from London, England, all on similar stories. The problem was that each tape wasn't really complete. "One had good camera work," Mick explains, "but lousy writing. Another had good writing, but lousy camera work." So Mick and Kris put all three into contact with each other and sent them out as a team to get the story on unemployment that appears in the first episode of "World Youth News."


17th Youth in Film Awards, Youth In Film's Special Awards, Outstanding Contribution To Youth Through Entertainment
"It's very interesting to see how kids from different countries have different skills and different approaches. But that still doesn't make me think they're really that different. I think if you went into any kid's room in any country in the world, you wouldn't be able to tell what country you were in. They're all wearing Reeboks and Levi's. I think kids are essentially the same the world over and that's why this concept is so powerful."


17th Youth in Film Awards, Youth In Film's Special Awards, Outstanding Contribution To Youth Through Entertainment
Interested in participating? The rules for becoming a correspondent are simple: you can be any age, but the ideal age is somewhere between twelve and twenty-five; you must have access to a video camera; and you must have something important to say.


17th Youth in Film Awards, Youth In Film's Special Awards, Outstanding Contribution To Youth Through Entertainment
"Obviously," Kris emphasizes, "the better the shooter you are, the better chance you have of seeing your story on the air. We do all the editing and graphics and final post-production work, so just get the best stuff you can and remember, quality audio is extremely important." (copyright Videomaker Magazine)


17th Youth in Film Awards, Youth In Film's Special Awards, Community Service Award
★ Special Olympics World Games 1995 – Kids TV – New Haven, Connecticut


17th and 18th Streets Crosstown Line
The 17th and 18th Streets Crosstown Line was a public transit line in Manhattan, New York City, United States, running mostly along 14th Street, 17th Street, and 18th Street from the West 14th Street Ferry in Chelsea and Christopher Street Ferry in the West Village to the East 23rd Street Ferry at Peter Cooper Village. It was not replaced with a trolley line or bus route when it was abandoned in 1913.


17th and 18th Streets Crosstown Line, History
The Central Crosstown Railroad was chartered March 28, 1873, and opened within a few years. The original line began at the Christopher Street Ferry and ran north on West Street (west of the Central Park, North and East River trackage), northeast on 11th Street, north on 7th Avenue (along Broadway and Seventh Avenue Railroad trackage), east on 14th Street to Union Square, north on Broadway (also Broadway and Seventh Avenue Railroad trackage), east on 17th Street (eastbound) and 18th Street (westbound), north on 1st Avenue (Central Park, North and East River Railroad trackage), and east on 23rd Street. Another line opened later, continuing west on 14th Street, including Bleecker Street and Fulton Ferry Railroad trackage west of 9th Avenue.


17th and 18th Streets Crosstown Line, History
The company leased the Christopher and Tenth Street Railroad, which also ran east from the Christopher Street Ferry, on May 28, 1890, and the Central Crosstown was acquired by the Metropolitan Street Railway in May 1897, though not leased until February 8, 1904. By 1907, the line to the Christopher Street Ferry was gone, and the 14th Street-Williamsburg Bridge Line used the 14th Street trackage west of Union Square. Instead, 17th and 18th Streets cars continued south from Union Square on University Place on a remnant of the original Broadway Line, ending at 8th Street. Service was terminated in 1913.


17th arrondissement of Paris
The 17th arrondissement of Paris (XVIIe arrondissement) is one of the 20 arrondissements of the capital city of France. In spoken French, this arrondissement is referred to as dix-septième (pronounced [di sɛtjɛm]).


17th arrondissement of Paris
The arrondissement, known as Batignolles-Monceau, is situated on the right bank of the River Seine.


17th arrondissement of Paris, Geography
The land area of this arrondissement is 5.669 km2 (2.189 sq. miles, or 1,401 acres).


17th arrondissement of Paris, Geography
Situated on the right bank of the River Seine, this arrondissement is divided in 4 administrative districts: Ternes and Monceau in the southwestern part, two upper-class districts which are more Haussmannian in style; in the middle of the arrondissement, the Batignolles district, an area mostly occupied by young families or couples, with a marked gentrification process; in the northeastern part, the Épinettes district, a former industrial district gone residential, which is mainly middle class and also experiencing a less advanced gentrification process.


17th arrondissement of Paris, Geography
The town hall of the 17th arrondissement is on Rue des Batignolles. It is the only town hall of Paris to be located in a modern building. The original building was torn down in 1971 to make room for the current edifice. The 17th arrondissement also hosts the Palais des Congrès of Paris, which is a large exhibition center with an associated high-rise hotel, the Hyatt Regency Paris Étoile, the largest in the city.


17th arrondissement of Paris, Demographics
The peak population of Paris's 17th arrondissement was reached in 1954, when it had 231,987 inhabitants. Today, the arrondissement remains dense in population and business activity, with 160,860 inhabitants and 92,267 jobs as of the most recent census (1999).


17th arrondissement of Paris, Demographics, Immigration
2 An immigrant is a person born in a foreign country not having French citizenship at birth. Note that an immigrant may have acquired French citizenship since moving to France, but is still considered an immigrant in French statistics. On the other hand, persons born in France with foreign citizenship (the children of immigrants) are not listed as immigrants.


17th arrondissement of Paris, Economy
The southwestern part of the arrondissement is very dense in offices, mostly for services. Several big companies have their headquarters there.


17th arrondissement of Paris, Economy
The head office of Dailymotion is located in the Immeuble Horizons 17. When it existed, Gaz de France had its head office in the 17th arrondissement.


17th arrondissement of Paris, Economy
Batignolles and Épinettes, two former industrial areas, are now mostly residential. The area around the avenue de Clichy, shared with the 8th, 9th and 18th arrondissement of Paris, is occupied by a lot of shops. This is the third biggest avenue of Paris in terms of sales.


17th arrondissement of Paris, Education
The Swedish school Svenska Skolan Paris is in the arrondissement.


17th century
The 17th century was the century that lasted from January 1, 1601 (MDCI), to December 31, 1700 (MDCC). It falls into the Early Modern period of Europe and in that continent (whose impact on the world was increasing) was characterized by the Baroque cultural movement, the latter part of the Spanish Golden Age, the Dutch Golden Age, the French Grand Siècle dominated by Louis XIV, the Scientific Revolution, the world's first public company and megacorporation known as the Dutch East India Company, and according to some historians, the General Crisis.


17th century
The greatest military conflicts were the Thirty Years' War, the Great Turkish War, Mughal–Safavid Wars (Mughal–Safavid War (1622–23), Mughal–Safavid War (1649–53)), Anglo-Mughal Indian War, and the Dutch–Portuguese War. It was during this period also that European colonization of the Americas began in earnest, including the exploitation of the silver deposits, which resulted in bouts of inflation as wealth was drawn into Europe.


17th century
In the Islamic world, the gunpowder empires – the Ottoman, Safavid and Mughal – grew in strength. Especially in the Indian subcontinent, Mughal architecture, culture and art reached its zenith, while the empire itself, during the sharia reign of Emperor Aurangzeb, is believed to have had the world's largest economy, bigger than the entirety of Western Europe and worth 25% of global GDP, and its wealthiest province, the Bengal Subah, signaled the period of proto-industrialization.


17th century
In Japan, Tokugawa Ieyasu established the Tokugawa shogunate at the beginning of the century, beginning the Edo period; the isolationist Sakoku policy began in the 1630s and lasted until the 19th century. In China, the collapsing Ming dynasty was challenged by a series of conquests led by the Manchu warlord Nurhaci, which were consolidated by his son Hong Taiji and finally consummated by his grandson, the Shunzi Emperor, founder of the Qing dynasty.


17th century
From the middle decades of the 17th century, European politics were increasingly dominated by the Kingdom of France of Louis XIV, where royal power was solidified domestically in the civil war of the Fronde. The semi-feudal territorial French nobility was weakened and subjugated to the power of an absolute monarchy through the reinvention of the Palace of Versailles from a hunting lodge to a gilded prison, in which a greatly expanded royal court could be more easily kept under surveillance. With domestic peace assured, Louis XIV caused the borders of France to be expanded. It was during this century that the English monarch became a symbolic figurehead and Parliament was the dominant force in government – a contrast to most of Europe, in particular France.


17th century
By the end of the century, Europeans were aware of logarithms, electricity, the telescope and microscope, calculus, universal gravitation, Newton's Laws of Motion, air pressure and calculating machines due to the work of the first scientists of the Scientific Revolution, including Galileo Galilei, Johannes Kepler, René Descartes, Pierre Fermat, Blaise Pascal, Robert Boyle, Christiaan Huygens, Antonie van Leeuwenhoek, Robert Hooke, Isaac Newton, and Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz. It was also a period of development of culture in general (especially theater, music, visual arts and philosophy).


17th century, Inventions, discoveries, introductions
Major changes in philosophy and science take place, often characterized as the Scientific revolution.


17th century BC
The 17th century BC was a century which lasted from 1700 BC to 1601 BC.


17th century BC, Sovereign states
See : List of sovereign states in the 17th century BC.


17th century in Wales
This article is about the particular significance of the century 1601–1700 to Wales and its people.


17th century in philosophy
This is a timeline of philosophy in the 17th century (17th-century philosophy).


17th government of Turkey
The 17th government of Turkey (10 June 1948 – 16 January 1949) was a short-term government in the history of Turkey. It is also known as the second Saka government.


17th government of Turkey, Background
Hasan Saka of the Republican People's Party (CHP), who was the previous prime minister, resigned on 8 June 1948. However, he was again assigned to form a government. His cabinet was not very different from the previous cabinet. The major addition was Nihat Erim, who was seen as the potential new leader of the party.


17th government of Turkey, The government
In the list below, the cabinet members who served only a part of the cabinet's lifespan are shown in the column "Notes".


17th government of Turkey, Aftermath
The Republican People's Party (CHP) was losing ground to the Democratic Party (DP), and CHP was looking for a more charismatic prime minister. After preparing a new election (which would prove to be disadvantageous to CHP in 1950), Saka resigned on 14 January 1949.


17th meridian east
The meridian 17° east of Greenwich is a line of longitude that extends from the North Pole across the Arctic Ocean, Europe, Africa, the Atlantic Ocean, the Southern Ocean, and Antarctica to the South Pole.


17th meridian east
The 17th meridian east forms a great circle with the 163rd meridian west.


17th meridian east, From Pole to Pole
Starting at the North Pole and heading south to the South Pole, the 17th meridian east passes through:


17th meridian west
The meridian 17° west of Greenwich is a line of longitude that extends from the North Pole across the Arctic Ocean, Greenland, Iceland, the Atlantic Ocean, Africa, the Southern Ocean, and Antarctica to the South Pole.


17th meridian west
The 17th meridian west forms a great circle with the 163rd meridian east.


17th meridian west, From Pole to Pole
Starting at the North Pole and heading south to the South Pole, the 17th meridian west passes through:


17th parallel north
The 17th parallel north is a circle of latitude that is 17 degrees north of the Earth's equatorial plane. It crosses Africa, Asia, the Indian Ocean, the Pacific Ocean, Central America, the Caribbean and the Atlantic Ocean.


17th parallel north
The parallel is particularly significant in the history of Vietnam (see below).


17th parallel north
At this latitude the sun is visible for 13 hours, 9 minutes during the summer solstice and 11 hours, 7 minutes during the winter solstice.


17th parallel north, Around the world
Starting at the Prime Meridian and heading eastwards, the parallel 17° north passes through:


17th parallel north, Vietnam
The Seventeenth parallel (Vietnamese: vĩ tuyến 17) was the provisional military demarcation line between North and South Vietnam established by the Geneva Accords of 1954. The demarcation line did not exactly coincide with the 17th parallel but ran south of it, approximately along the Bến Hải River in Quảng Trị Province to the village of Bo Ho Su and from there due west to the Laos–Vietnam border.


17th parallel north, Vietnam
In 1976 the demarcation line was made irrelevant as Vietnam was unified following the withdrawal of American forces and the surrender of the South Vietnamese government.


17th parallel south
The 17th parallel south is a circle of latitude that is 17 degrees south of the Earth's equatorial plane. It crosses the Atlantic Ocean, Africa, the Indian Ocean, Australasia, the Pacific Ocean and South America.


17th parallel south, Around the world
Starting at the Prime Meridian and heading eastwards, the parallel 17° south passes through:


17th-century French art
17th-century French art is generally referred to as Baroque, but from the mid- to late 17th century, the style of French art shows a classical adherence to certain rules of proportion and sobriety uncharacteristic of the Baroque as it was practiced in most of the rest of Europe during the same period.


17th-century French art, Louis XIII style
In the early part of the 17th century, late mannerist and early Baroque tendencies continued to flourish in the court of Marie de' Medici and Louis XIII. Art from this period shows influences from both the north of Europe (Dutch and Flemish schools) and from Roman painters of the Counter-Reformation. Artists in France frequently debated the merits between Peter Paul Rubens (the Flemish baroque, voluptuous lines and colors) and Nicolas Poussin (rational control, proportion, Roman classicism).


17th-century French art, Louis XIII style
There was also a strong Caravaggio school represented in the period by the candle-lit paintings of Georges de La Tour. The wretched and the poor were featured in an almost Dutch manner in the paintings by the three Le Nain brothers. In the paintings of Philippe de Champaigne there are both propagandistic portraits of Louis XIII' s minister Cardinal Richelieu and other more contemplative portraits of people in the Jansenist sect.


17th-century French art, Residential architecture
However, under Louis XIV, the Baroque as it was practiced in Italy was not in French taste (Bernini's famous proposal for redesigning the Louvre was rejected by Louis XIV.) Through propaganda, wars and great architectural works, Louis XIV launched a vast program designed for the glorification of France and his name. The Palace of Versailles, initially a tiny hunting lodge built by his father, was transformed by Louis XIV into a marvelous palace for fêtes and parties. Architect Louis Le Vau, painter and designer Charles Le Brun and the landscape architect André Le Nôtre created marvels : fountains danced; wandering revelers discovered hidden grottos in the gardens.


17th-century French art, Residential architecture
The initial impetus for this transformation of Versailles is generally linked to the private château Vaux-le-Vicomte built for Louis XIV's minister of Finance Nicolas Fouquet. Having offered a lavish festival for the king in the newly finished residence in 1661 (Le Brun, Le Vau, Le Nôtre, the poet La Fontaine, the playwright Molière were all under Fouquet's patronage), the minister was accused of misappropriation of funds and was sentenced to life imprisonment. The architects and artists under his patronage were all put to work on Versailles.


17th-century French art, The court of Louis XIV
In this period, Louis' minister Jean-Baptiste Colbert established royal control over artisanal production in France; henceforth France would no longer purchase luxury goods from abroad, but would, herself, set the standard for quality. This control was also seen in the creation of an academy of painting and sculpture, which maintained a hierarchy of genres in painting (the "noblest," according to André Félibien in 1667, being history painting), a strong use of pictorial rhetoric, and a strict sense of decorum in subject matter.


17th-century French art, The court of Louis XIV
Furnishings and interior designs from this period are referred to as Louis XIV-style; the style is characterized by weighty brocades of red and gold, thickly gilded plaster molding, large sculpted sideboards, and heavy marbling.


17th-century French art, The court of Louis XIV
In 1682 Versailles was transformed into the official residence of the king; eventually the Hall of Mirrors was built; other smaller châteaux, like the Grand Trianon, were built on the grounds, and a huge canal featuring gondolas and gondoliers from Venice was created.


17th-century French art, The court of Louis XIV
Through his wars and the glory of Versailles, Louis became, to a certain degree, the arbiter of taste and power in Europe and both his château and the etiquette in Versailles were copied by the other European courts. Yet the difficult wars at the end of his long reign and the religious problems created by the revocation of the Edict of Nantes made his last years dark ones.


17th-century French literature
Medieval16th century • 17th century18th century • 19th century20th century • Contemporary


17th-century French literature
17th-century French literature was written throughout the Grand Siècle of France, spanning the reigns of Henry IV of France, the Regency of Marie de Medici, Louis XIII of France, the Regency of Anne of Austria (and the civil war called the Fronde) and the reign of Louis XIV of France. The literature of this period is often equated with the Classicism of Louis XIV's long reign, during which France led Europe in political and cultural development; its authors expounded the classical ideals of order, clarity, proportion and good taste. In reality, 17th-century French literature encompasses far more than just the classicist masterpieces of Jean Racine and Madame de La Fayette.


17th-century French literature, Society and literature in 17th-century France
In Renaissance France, literature (in the broadest sense of the term) was largely the product of encyclopaedic humanism, and included works produced by an educated class of writers from religious and legal backgrounds. A new conception of nobility, modelled on the Italian Renaissance courts and theirconcept of the perfect courtier, was beginning to evolve through French literature.


17th-century French literature, Society and literature in 17th-century France
Throughout the 17th century this new concept transformed the image of the rude noble into an ideal of honnête homme ("the upright man") or the bel esprit ("beautiful spirit") whose chief virtues included eloquent speech, skill at dance, refined manners, appreciation of the arts, intellectual curiosity, wit, a spiritual or platonic attitude towards love and the ability to write poetry.


17th-century French literature, Society and literature in 17th-century France
Central to this transformation of literature were the salons and literary academies which flourished during the first decades of the 17th century; the expanded role of noble patronage was also significant. The production of literary works such as poems, plays, works of criticism or moral reflection was increasingly considered a necessary practice by nobles, and the creation (or patronage) of the arts served as a means of social advancement for both non- and marginalized noblemen. In the mid-17th century, there were an estimated 2,200 authors in France (mostly nobles and clergy), writing for a reading public of just a few tens of thousands. Under Cardinal Richelieu, patronage of the arts and literary academies increasingly came under the control of the monarchy.


17th-century French literature, Society and literature in 17th-century France, Salons and Academies
Henry IV's court was considered by contemporaries a rude one, lacking the Italianate sophistication of the court of the Valois kings. The court also lacked a queen, who traditionally served as a focus (or patron) of a nation's authors and poets. Henry's literary tastes were largely limited to the chivalric novel Amadis of Gaul. In the absence of a national literary culture, private salons formed around upper-class women such as Marie de Medici and Marguerite de Valois, devoting themselves to discussions of literature and society. In the 1620s, the most famous salon was held at the Hôtel de Rambouillet by Madame de Rambouillet; a rival gathering was organized by Madeleine de Scudéry.


17th-century French literature, Society and literature in 17th-century France, Salons and Academies
The word salon first appeared in French in 1664 from the Italian word sala, the large reception hall of a mansion. Before 1664, literary gatherings were often called by the name of the room in which they occurred -- cabinet, réduit, alcôve,  and ruelle. For instance, the term ruelle derives from literary gatherings held in the bedroom, a practice popular even with Louis XIV. Nobles, lying on their beds, would receive close friends and offer them seats on chairs or stools surrounding the bed. Ruelle ("little street") refers to the space between a bed and the wall in a bedroom; it became a name for these gatherings (and the intellectual and literary circles evolving from them), often under the wing of educated women in the first half of the 17th century.


17th-century French literature, Society and literature in 17th-century France, Salons and Academies
In the context of French scholastica, academies were scholarly societies which monitored, fostered, and critiqued French culture. Academies first appeared in France during the Renaissance, when Jean-Antoine de Baïf created one devoted to poetry and music, inspired by the academy of Italian Marsilio Ficino. The first half of the 17th century was marked by a phenomenal growth in private academies, organised around a half-dozen or a dozen individuals who met regularly. Academies were generally more formal and more focused on criticism and analysis than salons, which encouraged pleasurable discourse about society. However, certain salons (such as that of Marguerite de Valois) were closer to the academic spirit.


17th-century French literature, Society and literature in 17th-century France, Salons and Academies
In the mid-17th century, academies gradually came under government control and sponsorship and the number of private academies decreased. The first private academy to fall under governmental control was L'Académie française, which remains the most prestigious governmental academy in France. Founded in 1634 by Cardinal Richelieu, L'Académie française focuses on the French language.


17th-century French literature, Society and literature in 17th-century France, Aristocratic codes
In certain instances, the values of 17th-century nobility played a major part in the literature of the era. Most notable of these values are the aristocratic obsession with glory (la gloire) and majesty (la grandeur). The spectacle of power, prestige and luxury found in 17th-century literature may be distasteful or even offensive. Corneille's heroes, for example, have been labeled by modern critics as vainglorious, extravagant and prideful; however, contemporary aristocratic readers would see these characters (and their actions) as representative of nobility.


17th-century French literature, Society and literature in 17th-century France, Aristocratic codes
The château of Versailles, court ballets, noble portraits, triumphal arches – all of these were representations of glory and prestige. The notion of glory (whether artistic or military) was not vanity or boastfulness or hubris, but rather a moral imperative for the aristocracy. Nobles were required to be generous, magnanimous and to perform great deeds disinterestedly (i.e. because their status demanded it, without expectations of financial or political gain), and to master their own emotions (especially fear, jealousy and the desire for revenge).


17th-century French literature, Society and literature in 17th-century France, Aristocratic codes
One's status in the world demanded appropriate externalisation ( or "conspicuous consumption"). Nobles indebted themselves to build prestigious urban mansions (hôtels particuliers) and to buy clothes, paintings, silverware, dishes and other furnishings befitting their rank. They were also required to show generosity by hosting sumptuous parties and by funding the arts. Conversely, social parvenus who took on the external trappings of the noble classes (such as the wearing of a sword) were severely criticised, sometimes by legal action (laws concerning sumptuous clothing worn by the bourgeois existed since the Middle Ages). These aristocratic values began to be criticised in the mid-17th century; Blaise Pascal, for example, offered a ferocious analysis of the spectacle of power and François de La Rochefoucauld posited that no human act—however generous it pretended to be—could be considered disinterested.


17th-century French literature, Society and literature in 17th-century France, Classicism
In an attempt to restrict the proliferation of private centers of intellectual or literary life (so as to impose the royal court as the artistic center of France), Cardinal Richelieu took an existing literary gathering (around Valentin Conrart) and designated it as the official Académie française in 1634. Other original members included Jean Desmarets de Saint-Sorlin, Jean Ogier de Gombauld, Jean Chapelain, François le Métel de Boisrobert, François Maynard, Marin le Roy de Gomberville and Nicolas Faret; members added at the time of its official creation included Jean-Louis Guez de Balzac, Claude Favre de Vaugelas and Vincent Voiture. This process of state control of the arts and literature would be expanded even more during the reign of Louis XIV.


17th-century French literature, Society and literature in 17th-century France, Classicism
"Classicism" (as it applies to literature) implies notions of order, clarity, moral purpose and good taste. Many of these notions are directly inspired by the works of Aristotle and Horace, and by classical Greek and Roman masterpieces. In theater, a play should follow the Three Unities:


17th-century French literature, Society and literature in 17th-century France, Classicism
Although based on classical examples, the unities of place and time were seen as essential for the spectator's complete absorption into the dramatic action; wildly dispersed scenes in China or Africa, or over many years would—critics maintained—break the theatrical illusion. Sometimes, grouped with unity of action is the notion that no character should appear unexpectedly late in the drama.


17th-century French literature, Society and literature in 17th-century France, Classicism
These rules precluded many elements common in the baroque tragi-comedy: flying horses, chivalric battles, magical trips to foreign lands and the deus ex machina; the mauling of Hippolyte by a monster in Phèdre could only take place offstage. Finally, literature and art should consciously follow Horace's precept "to please and educate" (aut delectare aut prodesse est).


17th-century French literature, Society and literature in 17th-century France, Classicism
These rules (or codes) were seldom completely followed, and many of the 17th century's masterpieces broke these rules intentionally to heighten emotional effect:


17th-century French literature, Society and literature in 17th-century France, Classicism
In 1674 there erupted an intellectual debate (la querelle des Anciens et des Modernes) on whether the arts and literature of the modern era had achieved more than the illustrious writers and artists of antiquity. The Académy was dominated by the "Moderns" (Charles Perrault, Jean Desmarets de Saint-Sorlin) and Perrault's poem "Le Siècle de Louis le Grand" ("The Century of Louis the Great") in 1687 was the strongest expression of their conviction that the reign of Louis XIV was the equal of Augustus.


17th-century French literature, Society and literature in 17th-century France, Classicism
As a great lover of the classics, Nicolas Boileau-Despréaux found himself pushed into the role of champion of the Anciens (his severe criticisms of Desmarets de Saint-Sorlin's poems did not help), and Jean Racine, Jean de La Fontaine and Jean de La Bruyère took his defense. Meanwhile, Bernard le Bovier de Fontenelle and the newspaper Mercure galant joined the "Moderns". The debate would last until the beginning of the 18th century.


17th-century French literature, Society and literature in 17th-century France, Classicism
The term "classicism" is also linked to the visual arts and architecture of the period where it is also known as Style Louis XIV, most specifically to the construction of the Palace of Versailles (the crowning achievement of an official program of propaganda and regal glory). Although originally a country retreat used for special festivities—and known more for André Le Nôtre's gardens and fountains—Versailles eventually became the permanent home of the king.


17th-century French literature, Society and literature in 17th-century France, Classicism
By relocating to Versailles Louis effectively avoided the dangers of Paris (in his youth, Louis XIV had suffered during the civil and parliamentary insurrection known as the Fronde), and could also keep his eye closely on the affairs of the nobles and play them off against each other and against the newer noblesse de robe. Versailles became a gilded cage; to leave spelled disaster for a noble, for all official charges and appointments were made there. A strict etiquette was imposed; a word or glance from the king could make or destroy a career.


17th-century French literature, Society and literature in 17th-century France, Classicism
The king himself followed a strict daily regimen, and there was little privacy. Through his wars and the glory of Versailles Louis became, to a certain degree, the arbiter of taste and power in Europe; both his château and the etiquette in Versailles were copied by the other European courts. However, the difficult wars at the end of his long reign and the religious problems created by the revocation of the Edict of Nantes made the last years dark.


17th-century French literature, Prose, Les Amours and Les histoires tragiques
In France, the period following the Wars of Religion saw the appearance of a new form of narrative fiction (which some critics have termed the "sentimental novel"), which quickly became a literary sensation thanks to the enthusiasm of a reading public searching for entertainment after so many years of conflict. These short (and realistic) novels of love (or amours, as they are frequently called in the titles) included extensive examples of gallant letters and polite discourse, amorous dialogues, letters and poems inserted in the story, gallant conceits and other rhetorical figures.


17th-century French literature, Prose, Les Amours and Les histoires tragiques
These texts played an important role in the elaboration of new modes of civility and discourse of the upper classes (leading to the notion of the noble honnête homme). None of these novels have been republished since the early 17th century, and they remain largely unknown today. Authors associated with les Amours were Antoine de Nervèze, Nicolas des Escuteaux and François du Souhait. Meanwhile, the tradition of the dark tale—coming from the tragic short story (histoire tragique) associated with Bandello, and frequently ending in suicide or murder—continued in the works of Jean-Pierre Camus and François de Rosset.


17th-century French literature, Prose, The Baroque adventure novel
By 1610 the short novel of love had largely disappeared, as tastes returned to longer adventure novels (romans d'aventures) and their clichés (pirates, storms, kidnapped maidens) that had been popular since the Valois court. Amadis of Gaul was the favorite reading matter of Henri IV; Béroalde de Verville was still writing, and Nicolas de Montreux had just died in 1608. Both Nervèze and Des Escuteaux in their later works attempted multi-volume adventure novels, and over the next twenty years the priest Jean-Pierre Camus adapted the form to tell harrowing moral tales heavily influenced by the histoire tragique. The best known of these long adventure novels is perhaps Polexandre (1629–49) by the young author Marin le Roy de Gomberville.


17th-century French literature, Prose, The Baroque adventure novel
All these authors were eclipsed, however, by the international success of Honoré d'Urfé's novel l'Astrée (1607–1633). This story centered on the shepherd Céladon and his love, Astrée, and combined a frame tale device of shepherds and maidens meeting, telling stories and philosophizing on love (a form derived from the ancient Greek novel "the Aethiopica" by Heliodorus of Emesa) with a pastoral setting (derived from the Spanish and Italian pastoral tradition from such writers as Jacopo Sannazaro, Jorge de Montemayor, Torquato Tasso and Giambattista Guarini) of noble, idealized shepherds and maidens tending their flocks and falling in (and out of) love.


17th-century French literature, Prose, The Baroque adventure novel
The influence of d'Urfé's novel was immense, especially in its discursive structure (which permitted a large number of stories and characters to be introduced and their resolution to be delayed for thousands of pages; a roman à tiroirs). D'Urfé's novel also promoted a rarefied neo-Platonism, which differed profoundly from the physicality of the knights in the Renaissance novel (such as Amadis of Gaul). The only element of d'Urfé's work which did not produce imitations was its roman pastoral setting.


17th-century French literature, Prose, The Baroque adventure novel
In theorizing the origins of the novel, the early 17th century conceived of the form as "an epic in prose"; in truth, the epic poem at the end of the Renaissance had few thematic differences from the novel. Novelistic love had spilled into the epic, and adventurous knights had become the subject of novels. The novels from 1640 to 1660 would complete this melding. These novels contained multiple volumes and were structurally complicated, using the same techniques of inserted stories and tale-within-a-tale dialogues as d'Urfé.


17th-century French literature, Prose, The Baroque adventure novel
Often called romans de longue haleine (or "deep-breath books"), they usually took place in ancient Rome, Egypt or Persia, used historical characters (for this reason they are called romans héroiques) and told the adventures of a series of perfect lovers sent (by accident or misfortune) to the four corners of the world. Unlike the chivalric romance, magical elements and creatures were relatively rare. Furthermore, there was a concentration in these works on psychological analysis and on moral and sentimental questions which the Renaissance novel lacked. Many of these novels were actually romans à clé which described actual contemporary relationships under disguised novelistic names and characters. The most famous of these authors and novels are:


17th-century French literature, Prose, Baroque comic fiction
Not all fiction of the first half of the 17th century was a wild flight of fancy in far-flung lands and rarefied, adventurous love stories. Influenced by the international success of the picaresque novel from Spain (such as Lazarillo de Tormes), and by Miguel de Cervantes' short-story collection Exemplary Tales (which appeared in French beginning in 1614) and Don Quixote de la Mancha (French translation 1614–1618), the French novelists of the first half of the 17th century also chose to describe and satirize their own era and its excesses. Other important satirical models were provided by Fernando de Rojas' La Celestina and John Barclay's (1582–1621) two satirical Latin works, Euphormio sive Satiricon (1602) and Argenis (1621).


17th-century French literature, Prose, Baroque comic fiction
Agrippa d'Aubigné's Les Aventures du baron de Faeneste portrays the rude manners and comic adventures of a Gascon in the royal court. Charles Sorel's L'histoire comique de Francion is a picaresque-inspired story of the ruses and amorous dealings of a young gentleman; his Le Berger extravagant is a satire of the d'Urfé-inspired pastoral, which (taking a clue from the end of Don Quixote) has a young man take on the life of a shepherd.


17th-century French literature, Prose, Baroque comic fiction
Despite their "realism" Sorel's works remain highly baroque, with dream sequences and inserted narration (for example, when Francion tells of his years at school) typical of the adventure novel. This use of inserted stories also follows Cervantes, who inserted a number of nearly autonomous stories into his Quixote. Paul Scarron's most famous work, Le Roman comique, uses the narrative frame of a group of ambulant actors in the provinces to present both scenes of farce and sophisticated, inserted tales.


17th-century French literature, Prose, Baroque comic fiction
Cyrano de Bergerac (made famous by Edmond Rostand's 19th-century play) wrote two novels which, 60 years before Gulliver's Travels or Voltaire (or science fiction), use a journey to magical lands (the moon and the sun) as pretexts for satirizing contemporary philosophy and morals. By the end of the 17th century, Cyrano's works would inspire a number of philosophical novels, in which Frenchmen travel to foreign lands and strange utopias.


17th-century French literature, Prose, Baroque comic fiction
The early half of the 17th century also saw the continued popularity of the comic short story and collections of humorous discussions, typified by the Histoires comiques of François du Souhait; the playful, chaotic, sometimes-obscene and almost-unreadable Moyen de parvenir by Béroalde de Verville (a parody of "table talk" books, of Rabelais and of Michel de Montaigne's The Essays); the anonymous Les Caquets de l'accouchée (1622); and Molière d'Essertine's Semaine amoureuse (a collection of short stories).


17th-century French literature, Prose, Baroque comic fiction
A select list of baroque comique writers and works includes:


17th-century French literature, Prose, Baroque comic fiction
In the second half of the 17th century, contemporary settings would be also used in many classical nouvelles (novellas—especially as a moral critique of contemporary society).


17th-century French literature, Prose, The Nouvelle classique
By 1660, the multi-volume, baroque historical novel had largely fallen out of fashion. The tendency was for much shorter works (nouvelles or petits romans), without complex structure or adventurous elements (pirates, shipwrecks, kidnappings). This movement away from the baroque novel was supported by theoretical discussions on novel structure, which sought to apply the same Aristotelian and Horacian concepts of the three unities, decorum and verisimilitude that writers had imposed on the theater.


17th-century French literature, Prose, The Nouvelle classique
For example, Georges de Scudéry, in his preface to Ibrahim (1641), suggested that a "reasonable limit" for a novel's plot (a form of "unity of time") would be one year. Similarly, in his discussion on La Princesse de Clèves, the chevalier de Valincourt criticized the inclusion of ancillary stories within the main plot (a form of "unity of action").


17th-century French literature, Prose, The Nouvelle classique
An interest in love, psychological analysis, moral dilemmas and social constraints permeates these novels. When the action was placed in an historical setting, this was increasingly a setting in the recent past; although still filled with anachronisms, these nouvelles historiques demonstrated an interest in historical detail. A number of these short novels recounted the "secret history" of a famous event (like Villedieu's Annales galantes), linking the action to an amorous intrigue; these were called histoires galantes. Some of these short novels told stories of the contemporary world (such as Préchac's L'Illustre Parisienne).


17th-century French literature, Prose, The Nouvelle classique
The best-known of all of these is Madame de Lafayette's La Princesse de Clèves. Reduced to essentially three characters, the short novel tells the story of a married noblewoman during the reign of Henri II who falls in love with another man, but who reveals her passion to her husband. Although the novel includes several inserted stories, on the whole the narration concentrates on the unspoken doubts and fears of the two individuals living in a social setting dominated by etiquette and moral correctness; despite its historical setting, Lafayette was clearly describing her contemporary world.


17th-century French literature, Prose, The Nouvelle classique
The psychological analysis is close to the pessimism of La Rochefoucauld, and the abnegation of the main character leads ultimately to a refusal of a conventional happy ending. For all of its force, Madame de Lafayette's novel is not the first to have a recent historical setting or psychological depth (as some critics contend); these elements may be found in novels of the previous decade, and are already present in certain of the Amours at the beginning of the 17th century.


17th-century French literature, Prose, Other novelistic forms after 1660
The concerns of the nouvelle classique (love, psychological analysis, moral dilemmas and social constraints) are also apparent in the anonymous epistolary novel Lettres d'une religieuse portugaise (Letters of a Portuguese Nun) (1668), attributed to Guilleragues, which were a sensation when they were published (in part because of their perceived authenticity). These letters, written by a scorned woman to her absent lover, were a powerful representation of amorous passion with many similarities to the language of Racine.


17th-century French literature, Prose, Other novelistic forms after 1660
Other epistolary novels followed by Claude Barbin, Vincent Voiture, Edmé Boursault, Fontenelle (who used the form to introduce discussion of philosophical and moral matters, prefiguring Montesquieu's Lettres persanes in the 18th century) and others; actual love letters written by noble ladies (Madame de Bussy-Lameth, Madame de Coligny) were also published. Antoine Furetière (1619–1688) is responsible for a longer comic novel which pokes fun at a bourgeois family, Le Roman bourgeois (1666).


17th-century French literature, Prose, Other novelistic forms after 1660
The choice of the bourgeois arriviste or parvenu (a social climber, trying to ape the manners and style of the noble classes) as a source of mockery appears in a number of short stories and theater of the period (such as Molière's Bourgeois Gentihomme). The long adventurous novel of love continued to exist after 1660, albeit in a far shorter form than the novels of the 1640s.


17th-century French literature, Prose, Other novelistic forms after 1660
Influenced as much by the nouvelles historiques and nouvelles galantes as by the romans d'aventures and romans historiques, these historical novels—whose settings range from ancient Rome to Renaissance Castille or France—were published into the first decades of the 18th century. Authors include Madame Marie Catherine d'Aulnoy, Mlle Charlotte-Rose de Caumont La Force, Mlle Anne de La Roche-Guilhem, Catherine Bernard and Catherine Bédacier-Durand.


17th-century French literature, Prose, Other novelistic forms after 1660
A history of the novel, Traitté de l'origine des romans (1670), was written by Pierre Daniel Huet. This work (much like theoretical discussions on theatrical vraisemblance, bienséance and the nature of tragedy and comedy) stressed the need for moral utility; it made important distinctions between history and the novel, and between the epic (which treats of politics and war) and the novel (which treats of love). The first half of the 17th century had seen the development of the biographical mémoire (see below), and by the 1670s this form began to be used in novels. Madame de Villedieu (real name Marie-Catherine Desjardins), author of a number of nouvelles, also wrote a longer realistic work which represented (and satirized) the contemporary world via the fictionalized mémoires of young woman recounting her amorous and economic hardships, Mémoires de la vie d'Henriette Sylvie de Molière (1672–1674).


17th-century French literature, Prose, Other novelistic forms after 1660
The fictional mémoire form was used by other novelists as well. Courtilz de Sandras' novels (Mémoires de M.L.C.D.R. in 1687, Mémoires de M. d'Artagnan in 1700 and Mémoires de M. de B. in 1711) describe the world of Richelieu and Mazarin without gallant clichés; spies, kidnappings and political machinations predominate. Among the other mémoires of the period the best-known was the work of Englishman Anthony Hamilton, whose Mémoires de la vie du comte de Grammont... (telling of his years in the French court from 1643 to 1663) was published in France in 1713.


17th-century French literature, Prose, Other novelistic forms after 1660
Many of these works were published anonymously; in some cases it is difficult to tell whether they are fictionalized or biographical. Other authors include abbé Cavard, abbé de Villiers, abbé Olivier and le sieur de Grandchamp. The realism (and occasional irony) of these novels would lead directly to those of Alain-René Lesage, Pierre de Marivaux and Abbé Prévost in the 18th century.


17th-century French literature, Prose, Other novelistic forms after 1660
In the 1690s, the fairy tale began to appear in French literature. The best-known collection of traditional tales (liberally adapted) was by Charles Perrault (1697), although many others were published (such as those by Henriette-Julie de Murat and Madame d'Aulnoy). A major revolution would occur with the appearance of Antoine Galland's first French (and indeed modern) translation of the Thousand and One Nights (or Arabian Nights) (in 1704; another translation appeared in 1710–12), which would influence the 18th-century short stories of Voltaire, Diderot and many others.


17th-century French literature, Prose, Other novelistic forms after 1660
The period also saw several novels with voyages and utopian descriptions of foreign cultures (in imitation of Cyrano de Bergerac, Thomas More and Francis Bacon):


17th-century French literature, Prose, Other novelistic forms after 1660
Of similar didactic aim was Fénelon's Les Aventures de Télémaque (1694—96), which represents a classicist's attempt to overcome the excesses of the baroque novel; using a structure of travels and adventures (grafted onto Telemachus—the son of Ulysses), Fénelon exposes his moral philosophy. This novel would be emulated by other didactic novels during the 18th century.


17th-century French literature, Poetry
Because of the new conception of l'honnête homme (the honest or upright man), poetry became one of the principal genres of literary production of noble gentlemen and the non-noble professional writers in their patronage during the 17th century. Poetry was used for all purposes. A great deal of 17th- and 18th-century poetry was "occasional", meaning that it was written to celebrate a particular event (a marriage, birth or a military victory) or to solemnize a tragic occurrence (a death or a military defeat); this type of poetry was favored by gentlemen in the service of a noble or the king. Poetry was the chief form of 17th-century theater; the vast majority of scripted plays were written in verse (see "Theater" below). Poetry was used in satires (Nicolas Boileau-Despréaux is famous for his Satires (1666)) and epics (inspired by the Renaissance epic tradition and by Tasso) like Jean Chapelain's La Pucelle.


17th-century French literature, Poetry
Although French poetry during the reign of Henri IV and Louis XIII was still largely inspired by the poets of the late Valois court, some of their excesses and poetic liberties found censure—especially in the work of François de Malherbe, who criticized La Pléiade's and Philippe Desportes's irregularities of meter or form (the suppression of the cesura by a hiatus, sentence clauses spilling over into the next line—enjambement—neologisms constructed from Greek words, etc.). The later 17th century would see Malherbe as the grandfather of poetic classicism.


17th-century French literature, Poetry
The Pléiade poems of the natural world (fields and streams) were continued in the first half of the century—but the tone was often elegiac or melancholy (an "ode to solitude"), and the natural world presented was sometimes the seacoast or some other rugged environment—by poets who have been tagged by later critics with the "baroque" label (notably Théophile de Viau and Antoine Gérard de Saint-Amant).


17th-century French literature, Poetry
Poetry came to be a part of the social games in noble salons (see "salons" above), where epigrams, satirical verse, and poetic descriptions were all common (the most famous example is "La Guirlande de Julie" (1641) at the Hôtel de Rambouillet, a collection of floral poems written by the salon members for the birthday of the host's daughter).


17th-century French literature, Poetry
The linguistic aspects of the phenomenon associated with the précieuses (similar to Euphuism in England, Gongorism in Spain and Marinism in Italy)—the use of highly metaphorical (sometimes obscure) language, the purification of socially unacceptable vocabulary—was tied to this poetic salon spirit and would have an enormous impact on French poetic and courtly language. Although préciosité was often mocked (especially in the late 1660s, when the phenomenon had spread to the provinces) for its linguistic and romantic excesses (often linked to a misogynistic disdain for intellectual women), the French language and social manners of the 17th century were permanently changed by it.


17th-century French literature, Poetry
From the 1660s, three poets stand out. Jean de La Fontaine gained enormous celebrity through his Aesop and Phaedrus-inspired "Fables" (1668–1693), which were written in an irregular-verse form (different meter lengths are used in a poem). Jean Racine was seen as the greatest tragedy writer of his age. Finally, Nicolas Boileau-Despréaux became the theorizer of poetic classicism. His Art poétique (1674) praised reason and logic (Boileau elevated Malherbe as the first of the rational poets), believability, moral usefulness and moral correctness; it elevated tragedy and the poetic epic as the great genres and recommended imitation of the poets of antiquity. "Classicism" in poetry would dominate until the pre-romantics and the French Revolution.


17th-century French literature, Poetry
A select list of French poets of the 17th century includes:


17th-century French literature, Theater, Theaters and theatrical companies
During the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, public theatrical productions in Paris were under the control of guilds. During the last decades of the 16th century, only one of these continued to exist; although les Confrères de la Passion no longer had the right to perform mystery plays ( since 1548), they were given exclusive rights to oversee all theatrical productions in the capital and rented out their theater (the Hôtel de Bourgogne) to theatrical troupes for a steep price. In 1599 the guild abandoned its privilege, which permitted other theaters and theatrical companies to operate in the capital.


17th-century French literature, Theater, Theaters and theatrical companies
In addition to public theaters, plays were produced in private residences, before the court and in the university. In the first half of the 17th century the public, the humanist theater of the colleges and the theater performed at court exhibited a diversity of tastes; for example, while the tragicomedy was fashionable at the court during the first decade, the public was more interested in tragedy.


17th-century French literature, Theater, Theaters and theatrical companies
Early theaters in Paris were often placed in existing structures like tennis courts; their stages were narrow, and facilities for sets and scene changes were often non-existent (this would encourage the development of unity of place). Eventually theaters would develop systems of elaborate machines and decors, fashionable for the chevaleresque flights of knights found in the tragicomedies of the first half of the 17th century.


17th-century French literature, Theater, Theaters and theatrical companies
In the early part of the 17th century, theater performances took place twice a week, starting at two or three o'clock. Theatrical representations often encompassed several works; they began with a comic prologue, then a tragedy or tragicomedy, then a farce and finally a song. Nobles sometimes sat at the side of the stage during the performance. Since it was impossible to lower the house lights the audience was always aware of each other, and spectators were notably vocal during performances.


17th-century French literature, Theater, Theaters and theatrical companies
The place directly in front of the stage, without seats—the parterre—was reserved for men, but since these were the cheapest tickets the parterre was usually a mix of social groups. Elegant people watched the show from the galleries. Princes, musketeers and royal pages were given free admission. Before 1630, an "honest" woman did not go to the theater. Unlike England, France placed no restrictions on women performing on stage; however, the career of actors of either sex was seen as morally wrong by the Catholic Church (actors were excommunicated) and by the ascetic religious Jansenist movement. Actors typically had stage names referring to typical roles or stereotypical characters.


17th-century French literature, Theater, Theaters and theatrical companies
In addition to scripted comedies and tragedies, Parisians were also great fans of the Italian acting troupe who performed their Commedia dell'arte, a kind of improvised theater based on types. The characters from the Commedia dell'arte would have a profound effect on French theater, and one finds echoes of them in the braggarts, fools, lovers, old men and wily servants which still populate French theater. Finally, opera reached France during the second half of the 17th century.


17th-century French literature, Theater, Theaters and theatrical companies
Outside Paris, in the suburbs and the provinces, there were many wandering theatrical troupes; Molière got his start in such a troupe. The royal court and other noble houses were also important organizers of theatrical representations, ballets de cour, mock battles and other forms of divertissement for their festivities; in the some cases, the roles of dancers and actors were held by the nobles themselves. The early years at Versailles—before the massive expansion of the residence—were entirely devoted to such pleasures, and similar spectacles continued throughout the reign. Engravings show Louis XIV and the court seated outside before the Cour du marbre of Versailles, watching the performance of a play.


17th-century French literature, Theater, Theaters and theatrical companies
The great majority of scripted plays in the 17th century were written in verse. Notable exceptions include some of Molière's comedies; Samuel Chappuzeau, author of Le Théâtre François, printed one comedy play in both prose and verse at different times. Except for lyric passages in these plays, the meter used was a twelve-syllable alexandrine line with a regular pause (or cesura) after the sixth syllable. These lines were put into rhymed couplets; couplets alternated between "feminine" (i.e. ending in a mute e) and "masculine" (i.e. ending in a vowel other than a mute e, a consonant or a nasal vowel) rhymes.


17th-century French literature, Theater, Baroque theater
17th-century French theater is often reduced to three great names—Pierre Corneille, Molière and Jean Racine—and to the triumph of "classicism". The truth, however, is far more complicated. Theater at the beginning of the 17th century was dominated by the genres and dramatists of the previous generation; most influential in this respect was Robert Garnier. Although the royal court had grown tired of the tragedy (preferring the more-escapist tragicomedy), the theatergoing public preferred the former.


17th-century French literature, Theater, Baroque theater
This would change in the 1630s and 1640s when (influenced by the long baroque novels of the period) the tragicomedy—a heroic and magical adventure of knights and maidens—became the dominant genre. The amazing success of Corneille's Le Cid in 1637 and Horace in 1640 would bring the tragedy back into fashion, where it would remain for the rest of the 17th century.


17th-century French literature, Theater, Baroque theater
The most important source for tragic theater was Seneca and the precepts of Horace and Aristotle (plus modern commentaries by Julius Caesar Scaliger and Lodovico Castelvetro); plots were taken from classical authors such as Plutarch and Suetonius, and from Italian, French and Spanish short-story collections. The Greek tragic authors (Sophocles and Euripides) would become increasingly important by the middle of the 17th century.


17th-century French literature, Theater, Baroque theater
Important models for the 17th century's comedy, tragedy and tragicomedy were also supplied by the Spanish playwrights Pedro Calderón de la Barca, Tirso de Molina and Lope de Vega, many of whose works were translated and adapted for the French stage. Important theatrical models were also supplied by the Italian stage (including the pastoral) and Italy was also an important source for theoretical discussions on theater, especially regarding decorum (see, for example, the debates on Sperone Speroni's play Canace and Giovanni Battista Giraldi's play Orbecche).


17th-century French literature, Theater, Baroque theater
Regular comedies (i.e. comedies in five acts modeled on Plautus or Terence and the precepts of Aelius Donatus) were less frequent on the stage than tragedies and tragicomedies around the start of the 17th century; the comedic element of the early stage was dominated by farce, satirical monologues and by the commedia dell'arte. Jean Rotrou and Pierre Corneille would return to regular comedy shortly before 1630. Corneille's tragedies were strangely un-tragic (his first version of Le Cid was even listed as a tragicomedy), as they had happy endings. In his theoretical works on theater, Corneille redefined both comedy and tragedy around the following suppositions:


17th-century French literature, Theater, Baroque theater
The history of the public and critical reaction to Corneille's Le Cid may be found in other articles (he was criticized for his use of sources, his violation of good taste, and for other irregularities not conforming to Aristotian or Horacian rules), but its impact was stunning. Cardinal Richelieu asked the newly formed Académie française to investigate and pronounce on the criticism (it was the Academy's first official judgement), and the controversy reveals a growing attempt to control and regulate theater and theatrical forms. This would be the beginning of 17th-century "classicism". Corneille continued to write plays through 1674 (mainly tragedies, but also what he called "heroic comedies"). Many were successful, although the "irregularities" of his theatrical methods were increasingly criticized (notably by François Hédelin, abbé d'Aubignac); the success of Jean Racine from the late 1660s signaled the end of his preeminence.


17th-century French literature, Theater, Baroque theater
A select list of dramatists and plays, with indication of genre (dates are often approximate, as date of publication was usually long after the date of first performance), includes:


17th-century French literature, Theater, Theater under Louis XIV
By the 1660s, classicism had imposed itself on French theater. The key theoretical work on theater from this period was François Hedelin, abbé d'Aubignac's Pratique du théâtre (1657), and this work reveals to what degree "French classicism" was willing to modify the rules of classical tragedy to maintain the unities and decorum (d'Aubignac, for example, saw the tragedies of Oedipus and Antigone as unsuitable for the contemporary stage). Although Pierre Corneille continued to produce tragedies until the end of his life, the works of Jean Racine from the late 1660s on totally eclipsed the late plays of the elder dramatist.


17th-century French literature, Theater, Theater under Louis XIV
Racine's tragedies—inspired by Greek myths, Euripides, Sophocles and Seneca—condensed their plot into a tight set of passionate and duty-bound conflicts between a small group of noble characters, concentrating on these characters' double-binds and the geometry of their unfulfilled desires and hatreds. Racine's poetic skill was in the representation of pathos and amorous passion (like Phèdre's love for her stepson); his impact was such that emotional crisis would be the dominant mode of tragedy until the end of the 17th century. Racine's two late plays (Esther and Athalie) opened new doors to Biblical subject matter and the use of theater in the education of young women.


17th-century French literature, Theater, Theater under Louis XIV
Tragedy during the last two decades of the 17th century and the first years of the 18th century was dominated by productions of classics from Pierre Corneille and Racine, but on the whole the public's enthusiasm for tragedy had greatly diminished; theatrical tragedy paled beside the dark economic and demographic problems at the end of the 17th century, and the "comedy of manners" (see below) had incorporated many of the moral goals of tragedy.


17th-century French literature, Theater, Theater under Louis XIV
Other later-17th century tragedians include Claude Boyer, Michel Le Clerc, Jacques Pradon, Jean Galbert de Campistron, Jean de La Chapelle, Antoine d'Aubigny de la Fosse, l'abbé Charles-Claude Geneste and Prosper Jolyot de Crébillon. At the end of the 17th century (in Crébillon's plays especially), there occasionally appeared a return to the theatricality of the beginning of the century: multiple episodes, extravagant fear and pity, and the representation of gruesome actions on stage.


17th-century French literature, Theater, Theater under Louis XIV
Early French opera was especially popular with the royal court during this period, and composer Jean-Baptiste Lully was extremely prolific (see the composer's article for more on court ballets and opera in this period). These works carried on in the tradition of tragicomedy (especially the pièces à machines) and court ballet, and also occasionally presented tragic plots (or tragédies en musique). Dramatists working with Lully included Pierre Corneille and Molière but the most important of these librettists was Philippe Quinault, a writer of comedies, tragedies, and tragicomedies.


17th-century French literature, Theater, Theater under Louis XIV
Comedy in the second half of the 17th century was dominated by Molière. A veteran actor, master of farce, slapstick, the Italian and Spanish theater (see above), and "regular" theater modeled on Plautus and Terence, Molière's output was great and varied. He is credited with giving the French comedy of manners (comédie de mœurs) and the comedy of character (comédie de caractère) their modern form.


17th-century French literature, Theater, Theater under Louis XIV
His hilarious satires of avaricious fathers, précieuses, social parvenues, doctors and pompous literary types were extremely successful, but his comedies on religious hypocrisy (Tartuffe) and libertinage (Dom Juan) brought him criticism from the church; Tartuffe was only performed because of the king's intercession. Many of Molière's comedies (like Tartuffe, Dom Juan and Le Misanthrope) veered between farce and the darkest of dramas, and their endings are far from purely comic. Molière's Les précieuses ridicules was certainly based on an earlier play by Samuel Chappuzeau (best known for his work Le Theatre Francois (1674), which contains the most detailed description of French theatre during this period).


17th-century French literature, Theater, Theater under Louis XIV
Comedy until the end of the 17th century would continue on the path traced by Molière; the satire of contemporary morals and manners and the "regular" comedy would predominate, and the last great "comedy" of Louis XIV's reign (Alain-René Lesage's Turcaret) is a dark play in which almost no character exhibits redeeming traits.


17th-century French literature, Theater, Theater under Louis XIV
Below is a select list of French theater after 1659:


17th-century French literature, Other genres, Moral and philosophical reflection
The 17th century was dominated by a profound moral and religious fervor unleashed by the Counter-Reformation. Of all literary works, devotional books were the century's best sellers. New religious organisations swept the country (see, for example, the work of Saint Vincent de Paul and Saint Francis de Sales). The preacher Louis Bourdaloue (1632–1704) was known for his sermons, and theologian–orator Jacques-Benigne Bossuet (1627–1704) composed a number of celebrated funeral orations.


17th-century French literature, Other genres, Moral and philosophical reflection
Nevertheless, the 17th century had a number of writers who were considered "libertine"; these authors (like Théophile de Viau (1590–1626) and Charles de Saint-Evremond (1610–1703)), inspired by Epicurus and the publication of Petronius, professed doubts of religious or moral matters during a period of increasingly reactionary religious fervor. René Descartes' (1596–1650) Discours de la méthode (1637) and Méditations marked a complete break with medieval philosophical reflection.


17th-century French literature, Other genres, Moral and philosophical reflection
An outgrowth of counter-reformation Catholicism, Jansenism advocated a profound moral and spiritual interrogation of the soul. This movement would attract writers such as Blaise Pascal and Jean Racine, but would eventually come under attack for heresy (they espoused a doctrine bordering on predestination), and their monastery at Port-Royal was suppressed.


17th-century French literature, Other genres, Moral and philosophical reflection
Blaise Pascal (1623–1662) was a satirist for their cause (in his Lettres provinciales (1656–57)), but his greatest moral and religious work was his unfinished and fragmentary collection of thoughts justifying the Christian religion named Pensées (Thoughts) (the most famous section being his discussion of the "pari" or "wager" on the possible eternity of the soul). Another outgrowth of the religious fervor of the period was Quietism, which taught practitioners a kind of spiritual meditative state.


17th-century French literature, Other genres, Moral and philosophical reflection
François de La Rochefoucauld (1613–1680) wrote a collection of prose entitled Maximes (Maxims) in 1665 which analyzed human actions against a deep moral pessimism. Jean de La Bruyère (1645–1696)—inspired by Theophrastus's characters—composed his own collection of Characters (1688), describing contemporary moral types. François de La Mothe-Le-Vayer wrote a number of pedagogical works for the education of the prince.


17th-century French literature, Other genres, Moral and philosophical reflection
Pierre Bayle's Dictionnaire historique et critique (1695–1697; enlarged 1702), with its multiplicity of marginalia and interpretations, offered a uniquely discursive and multifaceted view of knowledge (distinctly at odds with French classicism); it would be a major inspiration for the Enlightenment and Diderot's Encyclopédie. Important Les Femmes and Grief des Dames and Digression about Montaigne's Essays by Madame Marie de Gournay