Pierre Corneille, the French dramatist, was born in Rouen in
1606. After a Jesuit education he worked as Crown Counsel in
Rouen, and for many years kept playwriting as his leisure
activity. He wrote tragedies and comedies, and his first success
came in 1636 with Le Cid, a tragi-comedy which made Corneille’s
reputation as a master of serious drama and established the
genre known as French classical tragedy. During the next forty
years Corneille produced over twenty-five plays. He died in
1684. Find Books by Pierre Corneille