Marivaux was elected a member of the Académie française in 1742. For the next twenty years, he contributed occasionally to the Mercure, wrote plays and reflections (which were seldom of much worth), and so forth. He died on 12 February 1763, aged seventy-five. Marivaudage The so-called marivaudage is the main point of importance about Marivaux's literary work, though the best of the comedies have great merits, and Marianne is an extremely important step in the development of the French novel. That, and Le Paysan parvenu, have some connection to the work of Samuel Richardson and Henry Fielding. In general, Marivaux's subject matter is the so-called "metaphysic of love-making." As Claude Prosper Jolyot Crébillon said, Marivaux's characters not only tell each other and the reader everything they have thought, but everything that they would like to persuade themselves that they have thought. This style derives mainly from Fontenelle and the Précieuses, though there are traces of it even in Jean de La Bruyère. It abuses metaphor somewhat, and delights to turn a metaphor in an unexpected and bizarre fashion. Sometimes a familiar phrase is used where dignified language would be expected; sometimes the reverse. Crébillon also described Marivaux's style as an introduction of words to each other which have never made acquaintance and which think that they will not get on together (this phrase is itself rather Marivaux-esque). This kind of writing, of course, recurs at several periods of literature, especially at the end of the 19th century. This fantastic embroidery of language has a certain charm, and suits the somewhat unreal gallantry and sensibility which it describes and exhibits. Marivaux possessed, moreover, both thought and observation, besides considerable command of pathos. Works Plays 1712: Le Père prudent et équitable 1720: L'Amour et la Vérité 1720: Arlequin poli par l'amour (Harlequin's Lesson of Love) 1720: Annibal, his only tragedy 1722: La Surprise de l'amour (The Agreeable Surprise) 1723: La Double Inconstance (Infidelities) 1724: Le Prince travesti 1724: La Fausse Suivante ou Le Fourbe puni (The False Servant) 1724: Le Dénouement imprévu 1725: L'Île des esclaves (Slave Island) 1725: L'Héritier de village 1726: Mahomet second (unfinished prose tragedy) 1727: L'Île de la raison ou Les petits hommes 1727: La Seconde Surprise de l'amour 1728: Le Triomphe de Plutus (Money Makes the World Go Round) 1729: La Nouvelle Colonie lost and then rewritten in 1750 with the title of La Colonie 1730: Le