List of French playwrights

This is an incomplete list of playwrights from France in chronological order, according to date of birth.

This is a dynamic list and may never be able to satisfy particular standards for completeness. You can help by adding missing items with reliable sources.

16th century

• Theodore Beza (1519–1605)
• Étienne Jodelle (1532–1573)
• Robert Garnier (1544–1590)
• Alexandre Hardy (1570–1632)

17th century

• Jean Mairet (1604–1686)
• Pierre du Ryer (1606–1658)
• Pierre Corneille (1606–1684)
• Jean Rotrou (1609–1650)
• Cyrano de Bergerac (1619–1655)
• Molière (1622–1673)
• Samuel Chappuzeau (1625–1701)
• Thomas Corneille (1625–1709)
• Philippe Quinault (1635–1688)
• Jean Racine (1639–1699)
• Jacques Robbe (1643-1721)
• Charles Rivière Dufresny (1648–1724)
• Jean Palaprat (1650–1721)
• Antoine de La Fosse (1653–1708)
• Madame Ulrich (1665–1707)
• Antoine Houdar de La Motte (1672–1731)
• Pierre de Marivaux (1688–1763)
• Pierre-François Godard de Beauchamps (1689–1761)
• Voltaire (1694–1778)
• Françoise de Graffigny (1695–1758)

18th century

• Pierre Beaumarchais (1732–1799)
• Louis-François Faur (1746–1829)
• Olympe de Gouges (1748–1793)
• Jean-Claude Gorgy (1753-1795)
• Jean Armand Charlemagne (1753–1838)
• Étienne Aignan (1773–1824)
• Victor Henri Joseph Brahain Ducange (1783–1833)
• Eugène Scribe (1791–1861)
• Alfred de Vigny (1797–1863)
• Antoinette Henriette Clémence Robert (1797–1872)
• Honoré de Balzac (1799–1850)

19th century

• Victor Hugo (1802–1885)
• Alexandre Dumas, père (1802–1870)
• Prosper Mérimée (1803–1870)
• Alfred de Musset (1810–1857)
• Théophile Gautier (1811–1872)
• Émile Augier (1820–1889)
• Gustave Flaubert (1821–1880)
• Alexandre Dumas, fils (1824–1895)
• Henri de Bornier (1825–1901)
• Laetitia Marie Wyse Bonaparte (1831–1902)
• Victorien Sardou (1831–1908)
• Henry Becque (1837–1899)
• Auguste Villiers de l'Isle-Adam (1838–1889)
• Émile Zola (1840–1902)
• Brada (1847-1938)
• Jules Lemaître (1853–1914)
• François, Vicomte de Curel (1854–1928)
• Maurice Bouchor (1855–1929)
• Paul Hervieu (1857–1915)
• Georges Courteline (1858–1929)
• Eugène Brieux (1858–1932)
• Marie Léopold-Lacour (1859-1942)
• Henri Lavedan (1859–1949)
• Charles Maurice Donnay (1859–1945)
• Georges Feydeau (1862–1921)
• Albert Guinon (1863–1923)
• Jules Renard (1864–1910)
• Edmond Rostand (1868–1918)
• Paul Claudel (1868–1955)
• Henry Kistemaeckers (1872–1938)
• Alfred Jarry (1873–1907)
• Fanny Clar (1875-1944)
• Guillaume Apollinaire (1880–1918)
• Jean Giraudoux (1882–1944)
• Sacha Guitry (1885–1957)
• Paul Gury (1888-1974)
• Jean Cocteau (1889–1963)
• Louis Verneuil (1893–1952)
• Rose Celli (1895–1982)
• Antonin Artaud (1896–1948)
• Marcel Achard (1899–1974)

20th century

• Jean Tardieu (1903–1995)
• Jean-Paul Sartre (1905–1980)
• Georges Schehadé (1905–1989)
• Eugène Ionesco (1909–1994)
• Jean Anouilh (1910–1987)
• Jean Genet (1910–1986)
• Albert Camus (1913–1960)
• Armand Gatti (1924–2017)
• Bernard-Marie Koltès (1948–1989)
• Yasmina Reza (born 1959)
• Éric-Emmanuel Schmitt (born 1960)
• Pavel Hak (born 1962)
• Sedef Ecer (born 1965)