Janbroche – a cloth merchant – forbids his daughter from selling anything while she keeps the shop in his absence. To all questions, she will have to answer “really, Mister, nay”. Polichinelle, sent by his master the Marquis to place an order for a suit, takes advantage of this repeated response to take her to bed with him. When he comes back, the merchant Jambroche finds her with Polichinelle and forces her to leave the house without her breeches (“culotte” – an article of clothing covering the body from the waist down to the knees). The Marquis demands that Polichinelle marry the young woman.

Rod and string marionette

Not specified

France

Paris

Printed

Seduction

Sexual intercourse

Obedience

Ridiculous

Trade

Deception

Farcical

Comical

French

Cloth merchant

The Interpreter

Pierrot

Polichinelle

Dancer

Marquis

Misunderstanding

Trap

Ballet

Dialogue with a character in the audience

Le Marchand ridicule

The foolish Merchant

Polichinelle’s wife has just died, and he asks his Compère (Companion) if he would like to marry him. The Compère refuses and suggests that Polichinelle buy a girl from Bonhomme Tatepoule – someone who sells girls for a living. Compère blindfolds Polichinelle so that he plays blind man’ buff and chooses a girl this way. Instead, Polichinelle catches a butterfly. A demon comes, dressed as a bundle of sticks, and Polichinelle grabs him. When he recovers his sight, Polichinelle gives up on his plan to remarry. Men and women peasants dance at the end of the play.

Wedding

Prospecting

Butterfly

Devil

Peasant

Peasant (female)

Disguise

Apparition of the Devil

Blind character

Polichinelle colin-maillard

Polichinelle playing blind man's buff

Rugantino is crying because he has just had three children, and a Gypsy woman has predicted that the first would be killed, that the second would kill and that the third would steal. A Genie with wings (a puppet with two wings of a hen) appears and asks him why he is distressed. Once he knows the reason, the Genie gives him advice so that his children do not head for trouble, even if the prophecy turns out to be true. The first will become a soldier so that his death is a source of honour; the second will become a doctor, so that he can kill without anyone reproaching him; the last will become a pork butcher, a job which will allow him to steal without being caught. Rugantino approves of this advice enthusiastically and relates that the pork butcher standing next to him and who is watching the show has indeed stolen from him in the morning of this very day, by selling him two slices of dried sausage for the same price as two whole saucissons. The audience hisses at the pork butcher, who runs and seeks refuge in his shop, which he closes, fearing that people will throw stones and destroy it.

Glove-puppet

Santangelo Gaetano (aka Ghetanaccio)

Italy

Rome

Printed excerpts

Cold cuts

Swindling

Satirical

Romanesco

Rugantino

Genie

Apparition of a genie

Allusion to the audience

[Rugantino e il pizzicarolo]

Rugantino and the pork butcher

Guignol tries to sell a bundle of little sticks carried by his donkey. The barber Pommadin tries to negotiate the price, but Guignol refuses. Pommadin ends the deal and pays the price required by Guignol, but he requests everything that the donkey carries. Guignol agrees, but Pommadin takes the stick that was holding everything together. Guignol complains to the burgomaster, but he sides with Pommadin. Guignol goes to Pommadin’s barber shop and asks for him and one of his friends to be shaved, reassuring Pommadin that he will pay for both of them in advance. Pommadin takes the money, and Guignol comes back with his donkey and forces Pommadin to shave it. The burgomaster is called again, but this time, he sides with Guignol. Pommadin wants the donkey out of his shop and thus has to reimburse and compensate Guignol. An Apothicaire (Apothecary) sells Guignol a remedy that will make his donkey obedient. A Marchande (Female Merchant), Marie, complains to Guignol that the donkey destroyed her crystal and porcelain shop, and they argue. Guignol and Niafron run away to go and have lunch together out of the city.

Lyon

Donkey

Beard

Judgment

Deceived deceiver

Le Marchand de picarlats (Vuillerme-Dunant's manuscript), Fonds Léopold Dor.

Le Marchand de génevottes; Le Marchand de fagots; Le Marchand de cotrets.

Guignol

coiffeur

Bourgmestre

Apothecary

Merchant (woman)

Monologue

Dialect as a social marker

Comic distortion of language

Deceived naivety

Fight with an animal

Plot twist

Le Marchand de picarlats

The picarlats Merchant

The rich Niflanguille goes to buy a bag of coal. He comes across the hungry Pierrot, who asks for his help in vain. The coalman cheats Niflanguille out of the weight of the bag. Pierrot hides in the bag and beats up the coalman, Niflanguille and the servant. Back home, Niflanguille looks for a sword to pierce the recalcitrant bag, but Pierrot gets it out in time and forces the servant to take his place. While Niflanguille pierces the bag and his servant with it, Pierrot runs away with a bag of money. A Gendarme wants to hang Niflanguille for murder, Pierrot for theft and the coalman for swindling. Pierrot kills the Gendarme and puts him in the sack, which he throws away, while Niflanguille flees through the window. Pierrot kills the coalman to avoid sharing the money, then orders wine which he pays for by beating the innkeeper with a stick. The Commissaire arrives with Niflanguille; he hangs Pierrot, but confiscates the money to punish the bad rich man.

All audiences

Duranty Louis Émile Edmond

Charcoal

Hunger

Poverty

Contempt

Punishment

Money

Bad rich

Didactic

Coal merchant

Domestic servant

Constable

Police Superintendant

Hidden character

Running gag

Blow-with-a-stick

Hanging scene

Le Sac de charbon

The Bag of Coal

The king's daughter is to be married, but she will only marry a man who is both rich and intelligent. Known for his wit, Arlequin arrives at the palace, only to be beaten back with a stick by the Swiss guard at the entrance. Desperate, he confides his misadventure to a beggar, who suggests that he should become rich by setting up a business in beating people with sticks. Arlequin decides to do so. The customers, who come in great numbers, make his fortune. But Arlequin, increasingly revolted by their wickedness, ends up beating his customers with a stick. Rich enough and threatened with hanging by the Commissaire, he gives his business to Pierrot for free. Pierrot hangs the Commissaire, who has come to hang him, and comes to ask Arlequin for an explanation. Thanks to his wealth and wit, Arlequin is able to marry the princess and have Pierrot appointed as the new Commissaire.

Wealth

Witty man

Wickedness

Revenge

Discord

Scruples

Arlecchino

Swiss

Beggar

Cassandre

Cassandra

King

Herald

Aside

Le Marchand de coups de bâton

Merchant of blows-with-a-stick

Guignol embarks on a hot-air balloon set for the Moon, in order to escape poverty and make his fiancée’s dreams come true. The balloon takes him first to the Mer de Glace (a glacier in France), then close to the Sun, and finally to the Moon. Guignol is captured by the guards. But when he meets the king of the Moon, he succeeds in convincing him that it would be more profitable for him to keep him as an ally, since he could establish trades between the Moon and the Earth. Guignol also shows the king the power of firearms, which are manufactured on Earth. Firearms being a lot more effective than the low-tech weapons of the Moon, Guignol promises the king that they will help him subdue an enemy neighbour. He is then appointed general. Gnafron and Madelon eventually travel to the Moon too, and the play ends with a feast.

Manuscript

Excessive drinking

Cosmic journey

Gas balloon

Parachute

Communication

Bear

Army

Parodistic

Fantasy

First page of the handwritten manuscript of Guignol dans la Lune

Pièce féerique en 8 tableaux

Gnafron

Madelon

Prosecutor

Queen

Prime Minister

Soldier

Change of social status

Allusion to current literary events

Metadiscourse on puppet theatre

Letter

Pyrotechnics

Guignol dans la Lune

Guignol on the Moon

Sir William comes to Guignol to suggest that he and Gnafron go sell pills and polish in Africa. The pills would whiten black people’s skins, and the polish would keep intact the skin colour of everyone who would like to stay black. The two friends accept, unaware that the commercial journey is a cover for the true mission, which is to stop captain Marchand from reaching Fashoda. They are joined by doctor Béziclier, who studies races, and his daughter Luce. In Africa, Gnafron’s business is not going well—nobody wants to buy the pills. On the other hand, Guignol’s polish sells very well. Guignol and Luce are in love, but Béziclier has already promised his daughter to their guide Friponi, who actually works for the British. Yet, the Italian man does not love Luce, who is only a means to his ends. With the help of Bétéké and his companions, he kidnaps Luce and Naora, the slave who travels with her. Friponi then brings the bad news to the doctor and to Guignol and Gnafron, and then goes to the two women’s “rescue”. He makes Korouto, the king of Bangala, believe that the French plan to “slaughter everyone and wipe everything out” and that he himself – Friponi – can prevent that from happening. To do so, he will need Korouto’s army, which the king agrees to lend him. Because the Italian does not need Luce, the king suggests that she be proposed to Joudochik, the king of a neighbouring land. Naora is in fact Korouto’s daughter. She explains to her father that the French have come to trade – not to wage war – and that Friponi is the real villain. The king understands that he was mistaken and decides to help the French find Luce. Joudochik is willing to give Luce back to Guignol, if she does not curse him. Luce agrees and promises him prosperity instead. Friponi understands that he has to stop the French on his own, and so he sets the forest on fire. Guignol and Gnafron catch and then kill him. Guignol and his friends arrive at Fashoda and befriend the Mahdi – the leader of the Soudanese people. Major Marchand announces that the Congo-Nile road has been drawn. Sirdar Kitchener, an English officer, contests it: Khartoum and Fashoda are theirs. The Major says that his soldiers would rather die than retreat, so the English pulls back in the end. The French have won Fashoda.

Raciology

Racism

Slavery

Homeland

Woman doctor

Kidnapping

Colonialism

Africa

Tony Tardy, Guignol à Fachoda (title page)

Italian

Traitor

Doctor

Prussian

English man

Colonel

African

Counselor

Sudanese

Commanding officer

Jean-Baptiste Marchand

Lieutenant

Officer

Horatio Herbert Kitchener

Rifleman

Senegalese

Slave

Peuples noirs de l'Oubanghui et du Soudan

Versified passages

Off-stage voice

Comical foreign accent

Song

Final song

Apotheosis

Guignol à Fachoda

Guignol at Fashoda

Carcassier, a soft cheese merchant, finds it hard to make a living from his trade. He would like to marry the governor's daughter, whose father would like to find her a rich and intelligent husband. His friend Barbantu offers to buy his cheese business on credit, but Carcassier refuses. Beaten by the Palace Doorman while trying to meet the governor's daughter, Carcassier is desperate. He meets a beggar who suggests that he learns from his misadventure and make a business selling sticks. Clients flock to Carcassier and he becomes richer, feeding the growing desire for revenge on his clients/victims. Feeling the wind shift, Carcassier gave up his business for free to Barbantu. The Commissioner arrives to stop this trade, arrests Barbantu and wants to hang him. Barbantu tricks and hangs the Commissioner instead. For his part, Carcassier goes to the Palace, offers his fortune to the Governor in exchange for his daughter's hand in marriage and promises to stop trading sticks. He convinced the governor to spare Barbantu and give him the vacant post of Commissioner.

Shopkeeper

Landlord

Governor

Comical regional accent

The Merchant of blows-with-a-stick

Lord Grey and John Bull are looking for a pretext to declare war on Germany, which is competing with England in the field of industrial development. The announcement of the murder of François-Ferdinand in Sarajevo, related by Kasperl, Grey’s servant, provides them with one such pretext, but they have to distort the event and make it seem as if Austria attacked Serbia. Grey and John Bull gather their allies from the Triple Entente, Prince Wodkasoff and Delcassé. They also join forces with the devil of lies. Kasperl lets a word of indignation slip, and he is thrown in prison. On the German side, Germania warns her husband Michel about the rapacity of their neighbours, when Kasperl, just escaped from prison, comes to warn them about the conspiracy planned by the countries of the Entente. The devil of lies tries to play Hans off against his parents, Germania and Michel, but he is struck with a stick. Wary of Italy, the Germans ally themselves with Josef (the Czech) and Janos (the Hungarian): the Triple Entente goes to war. In 1914-1915, the countries of the Entente fail to make progress against the enemy. Desperate, Grey seeks advice in hell, where King Edward VII plays cards with Pluto and Kitchener. Mammon, the devil of money, is thus sent to corrupt the countries who remained neutral. In Italy, he will even corrupt the poet D’Annunzio in order to make the people rise against Germany. In order to hasten Mammon’s return, Pluto puts the clock forward by one year: it is now 1916-1917, and Grey has been replaced by Lloyd George, a more energetic man. But Lloyd George also goes seek advice in hell. Mammon’s intervention was not sufficient to weaken Germany’s resistance. The devil of lies comes again on the stage, disguised as an angel of peace, to announce that the United States have entered the war. There is an uproar in hell. Pluto concludes the play with a reminder that he will always be the one to win, no matter what: either Germany is victorious, and he retrieves the souls of Grey, Lloyd George, Iswolski, Northcliff, Delcassé “and so on”, or England wins, and planet Earth becomes hell, meaning that Pluto could enjoy his retirement.

Le Marchand ridicule

Polichinelle colin-maillard

[Rugantino e il pizzicarolo]

Le Marchand de picarlats

Le Sac de charbon

Le Marchand de coups de bâton

Guignol dans la Lune

Pièce féerique en 8 tableaux

Guignol à Fachoda

Le Marchand de coups de bâton

Grey & Co

King Edward's unselige Erben