Ménestrier's Theory of the Dance as Drama: Origin of the Ballet d'Action

In 1682, the Jesuist Ménestrier published Des Ballets anciens et modernes selon les règles du théâtre. This book was one of the earliest works to build a theory of the dance as drama, and it was an important source for the theories of Cahusac and Noverre, who led the ballet d’action movement in the 18th century. The main purpose of this study is to reveal one of the origins of the theory of the dance as drama by analysing Ménestrier’s theory in the 17th century. Ménestrier established a theory of dance as drama by referring to Aristotle’s Poetics, the theme of which is the arts as imitation. In Poetics, the tragedy is mainly discussed. Therefore, Ménestrier compared the dance to tragedy, and he tried to rewrite Poetics to apply to the dance. That is, the dance as drama arises as the imitation of
art. According to Ménestrier, while ‘speech’ is used to imitate in tragedy, in the ballet, which is ‘silent tragedy,’ the ‘image/figure’ is the medium of imitation. Moreover, in view of the character of the image, Ménestrier redefines the rules to accommodate the ballet, incorporating ‘unity of design’ rather than the ‘unity of action’ that is present in the tragedy. Therefore, the theory of the dance as drama was established by rearranging the order of tragedy in Poetics to apply to the ballet.