Perry Gethner

Editor of "Pierre Du Ryer, Théâtre complet, Volume 2"

January 10, 2022

Dr. Perry Gethner has taught at Oklahoma State University since 1984. Dr. Gethner's courses have included French at all levels as well as humanities courses for the Honors College. Dr. Gethner's research is mostly focused on early modern French drama, especially religious plays, plays featuring music and spectacle, baroque opera libretti and works by women playwrights. Dr. Gethner has published numerous critical editions and translations, plus roughly 100 articles and entries in reference works. He was active in the application process for a Phi Beta Kappa chapter and currently serves as chapter secretary.

This is part of a 4-volume collection bringing together for the first time all 20 plays by Pierre Du Ryer, one of the most gifted and influential French playwrights from the second quarter of the 17th century. For Volume 2, Gethner edited the tragicomedy Cléomédon. This work, first performed in 1634 and first published in 1636, was reissued the following year in a slightly revised edition. It was never again published until now, and apparently it was never performed since the 1630s. Cléomédon, based on an episode in the hugely influential novel "L'Astrée," is subversive for the time in its presentation of rulers whose conduct is flagrantly unethical (though they reform at the end), and in the role of a hero whose meteoric rise from slave to lead general is marred with self-doubt.

URL: https://library-dep.okstate.edu/news/celebratingbooks/2022-honorees/perry-gethner

Last Updated: 19 January 2022