Molière Molière Jean-Baptiste Poquelin, known by his stage name Molière (; ; 15 January 162217 February 1673), was a French playwright, actor and poet, widely regarded as one of the greatest writers in the French language and universal literature. His extant works includes comedies, farces, tragicomedies, comédie-ballets, and more. His plays have been translated into every major living language and are performed at the Comédie-Française more often than those of any other playwright today. His influence is such that the French language itself is often referred to as the "language of Molière". Born into a prosperous family and having studied at
Jean-Baptiste Malter Jean-Baptiste Malter Jean-Baptiste Malter (6 November 1701 - 1746) was a French dancer and dance master, known under the names Aubin-Jean-Michel Malter, Jean-Baptiste or Jean-Nicolas. He was the son of Jean-Nicolas Malter, known as de Saint-Aubin, and of Madeleine Gosselin, and thus a member of the Malter family of dancers. He was born in Bordeaux, where he learned dance from his father, who was there received in the confraternity of dance masters on 29 December 1710. In Marseille on 19 June 1725, he married Catherine Dussoye, known as Labbé, a young dancer from Toulouse. The couple danced in Tours in