Perhaps no other writer of the classical age of French literature has undergone such dramatic swings in public acceptance and appreciation as Pierre Corneille. Enthusiastically received by his contemporaries at the time of the première of Le Cid and acclaimed as a genius of theatrical invention for several seasons to follow, Corneille felt for the first time in 1645, with the production of Théodore, the sting of rejection. A series of plays that met with sharp disapproval from both the critics and the public ensued, and, finally, with the failure of Pertharite in 1652 after only one performance, the weary dramatist acknowledged his passing from favor with theatre audiences and withdrew from dramatic production for seven years. However, when he returned to the stage in 1659 with the production of Oedipe, he once again found audiences willing to accept his particular style of tragedy. But his newly recovered mastery proved to be short-lived, for his moment of glory was soon dimmed by the brilliance of a young rival whose style and mood seemed more in harmony with that of audiences in the 1660's. During the remaining years of the seventeenth century Corneille was recognized as the talented author of the famous quartet of tragedies—Le Cid, Horace, Polyeucte, and Cinna—but the other plays of his repertory were generally ignored. The eighteenth century was particularly harsh in its attitude toward Corneille's dramatic compositions, which were scorned for their grandiloquent and unnatural style and ridiculed for their ponderous debates on the hierarchy of duties that forms the basis of so many Cornelian conflicts. Although Corneille began to find favor again with the Romantics, he was never as highly esteemed as his younger colleague, Racine. An ambivalent attitude toward the genius of Corneille and the literary merits of his work has persisted to the present day. Even though the universal themes of duty, honor, love, faith, and patriotism remain as true today as they were more than three hundred years ago, the modern reader feels at times bewildered and occasionally frustrated by the ornate linguistic style of Cornelian tragedy. However, we [can] see that the use of such a complex and embellished manner of speech contributes significantly to the definition of the characters' individual psyches and to the establishment of an appropriate psychological atmosphere for the tragedies.

The tragedies of Pierre Corneille have been criticized since the time of Voltaire for their grandiloquence, bombast, and excessive ornamentation; they are frequently characterized as being unrealistic and unnatural in both content and form. Critics have renounced the plays of Corneille for their failure to reflect the natural manner of expression of ordinary human beings, and this observation is quite accurate. But one must remember that Corneille's heroes and antagonists are not ordinary human beings who speak and act according to the codes of modern society; Corneille's personages are, on the contrary, extraordinary, superhuman creatures who belong to a rarefied heroic universe to which the conventional, everyday mortal, filled as he is with doubts, uncertainties, and trepidations, does not have access.

The exuberance and lyrical majesty of Corneille's style in his early tragedies is due at least partially to the writer's acquaintance with the declamatory grandiloquence of Renaissance tragedy. As a student in Rouen the young Corneille undoubtedly read the works of Jodelle, Montchrestien, Desmasures, La Taille, and Grevin whose works frequently echo the lyrical harmony of the Pléiade. The lengthy and ornate monologues coupled with the presence of lyrical choruses that serve as a commentary and elaboration of the action no doubt inspired the young dramatist to model the dramatic discourses of his early tragedies on the Renaissance style.

During the early years of the seventeenth century, especially in provincial centers such as Rouen, the philosophical heritage of the Renaissance still lived. The humanistic ideals that proclaimed man's innate goodness, probity, and strength of character had not, during the formative years of Corneille's education and training, yielded to the pessimistic view of human nature that would shadow the moral atmosphere of Corneille's later years. In the first few decades of the seventeenth century man continued to be seen as a powerful and virtuous creature whose will could triumph over most obstacles of human invention. And the individual was free to espouse the loftiest of ideals, which he was quite capable of defending and promulgating. Paul Bénichou has observed that Corneille has not in modern times been generally appreciated because of the "inhumaine bienséance morale" of his work [Morales du grand siècle, 1948]. Modern readers often feel uncomfortable with the uncompromising commitment to a sublime ideal that is made by so many Cornelian heroes; these readers dismiss as vainglorious, pompous, even absurd the Cornelian dedication to virtue, honor, and duty. Corneille's contemporaries, however, did not share this sentiment, for they greatly admired the passion, fire, and vigor of Cornelian tragedy. Mme de Sévigné spoke for the majority of her contemporaries when she wrote of her admiration for "ces tirades … qui font frissoner." During the age of Louis XIII the humanistic ideals still prevailed, particularly among the aristocracy who were, during this epoch, making a last heroic effort to affirm their supremacy with respect to the king. Under the ineffectual Louis XIII and during the minority of Louis XIV the power and influence of the nobility were aggrandized to the point that the aristocrats maintained for the last time the illusion that they were in control of France. During this period, which coincides with the composition of Corneille's most noble and grandiloquent tragedies, the nobility clung ferociously to the last vestiges of their feudal supremacy. The heroic stoicism and lofty eloquence of such heroes as Rodrigue, Horace, Polyeucte, and Auguste seem quite natural in the "atmosphère de la gloire, de la générosité et du romanesque aristocratiques, telle qu'on la respirait en France pendant le règne de Louis XIII … " [Bénichou]. The grandiloquent monologues, tirades, and stances spoken by Cornelian heroes and heroines in the early tragedies thus mirror the prevailing moral and psychological atmosphere of the times. And Corneille was not alone in glorifying the super-human hero whose will was stronger than his passions and whose polished discourse echoes the sublimity of his nature; exceptional individuals who are strong in soul and sublime in speech abound in the tragedies of Corneille's contemporaries such as Tristan l'Hermite, Rotrou, Mairet, Scudéry, and Du Ryer.

Corneille's style is thus a faithful mirror of the psychological, philosophical, and social attitudes of his day. Corneille's heroes belong to the rarefied universe of the French aristocracy at the crucial moment of its last undaunted assertion of political authority. Corneille creates a lofty and grandiloquent parlance for heroes who are larger than life, whose passions, ideals, and aspirations are noble, august, defiant, and majestic. Their speech is the somewhat pompous, ostentatious style appropriate to the aristocratic cavaliers who saw themselves as the appointed instigators of all movement in French society—a right to which they were entitled by their illustrious ancestry. And yet their manner of speech is not the mere braggadocio of a swaggering miles gloriosus; Corneille's heroes, like many of their real counterparts, were firmly committed to illustrious ideals and lofty aspirations that could be expressed only in extraordinary language. In this context, the elaborate discourses so brilliantly colored with highly ornate figures of speech and thought are in perfect accord with the lofty ideals of the hero who strives constantly to subjugate his base passions to his will and reason.