SCENE I (Music Master, Dancing Master, Musicians, and Dancers)
(The play opens with a great assembly of instruments, and in the middle of the stage is a
pupil of the Music Master seated at a table composing a melody which Monsieur
Jourdain has ordered for a serenade.)
MUSIC MASTER: (To Musicians) Come, come into this room, sit there and wait until
he comes.
DANCING MASTER: (To dancers) And you too, on this side.
MUSIC MASTER: (To Pupil) Is it done?
MUSIC MASTER: Let's see. . . This is good.
DANCING MASTER: Is it something new?
MUSIC MASTER: Yes, it's a melody for a serenade that I set him to composing here,
while waiting for our man to awake.
DANCING MASTER: May I see it?
MUSIC MASTER: You'll hear it, with the dialogue, when he comes. He won't be long.
DANCING MASTER: Our work, yours and mine, is not trivial at present.
MUSIC MASTER: This is true. We've found here such a man as we both need. This is a
nice source of income for us -- this Monsieur Jourdain, with the visions of nobility and
gallantry that he has gotten into his head. You and I should hope that everyone resembled
him.
DANCING MASTER: Not entirely; I could wish that he understood better the things
that we give him.
MUSIC MASTER: It's true that he understands them poorly, but he pays well, and that's
what our art needs now more than anything else.
DANCING MASTER: As for me, I admit, I feed a little on glory. Applause touches me;
and I hold that, in all the fine arts, it is painful to produce for dolts, to endure the
barbarous opinions of a fool about my choreography. It is a pleasure, don't tell me
otherwise, to work for people who can appreciate the fine points of an art, who know how
