In this paper, the author tries to demonstrate how, at a given moment in French literature, translation functions as a keystone of French theatrical life, and how it reflects many basic structural principles of the theatre as a system within French culture. The situation the author deals with is rather particular since theatre occupies a central position in the French literary system as a whole, at least in the first half of the 19th century. Moreover, the systematic organisation of French literature is a very rigid one, with very strong opposites between different sub-systems, along hierarchies of norms and models. These circumstances indicate why the author's analysis if the theatrical system has obvious implications for literary evolution throughout the first half of the 19th century.