Zaïre (play)

Zaïre (French pronunciation: ​[za.iʁ]; The Tragedy of Zara) is a five-act tragedy in verse by Voltaire. Written in only three weeks, it was given its first public performance on 13 August 1732 by the Comédie française in Paris. It was a great success with the Paris audiences and marked a turning away from tragedies caused by a fatal flaw in the protagonist's character to ones based on pathos. The tragic fate of its heroine is caused not through any fault of her own, but by the jealousy of her Muslim lover and the intolerance of her fellow Christians. Zaïre was notably revived in 1874 with Sarah Bernhardt in the title role, and it was the only one of Voltaire's plays to be performed by the Comédie française during the 20th century. The play was widely performed in Britain well into the 19th century in an English adaptation by Aaron Hill and was the inspiration for at least thirteen operas.

Zaïre was the first successful French tragedy to include French characters. Voltaire ostensibly set the play in the "Epoch of Saint Louis". However, the plot and characters are largely fiction. The historical characters alluded to, members of the Lusignan and Châtillon families, were related to events of the Crusades but not alive at the time of Louis IX. Although, some Anglophone writers, most notably Aaron Hill and Thomas Lounsbury, have tended to emphasise the plot similarities between Zaïre and Shakespeare's Othello, the resemblance is only superficial.

...
Wikipedia