1.
French literature
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This article is a general introduction to French literature. For detailed information on French literature in specific periods, see the separate historical articles in the template to the right. Literature written in French language, by citizens of nations such as Belgium, Switzerland, Canada, Senegal, Algeria, Morocco. As of 2006, French writers have been awarded more Nobel Prizes in Literature than novelists, poets and essayists of any other country, France itself ranks first in the list of Nobel Prizes in literature by country. French literature has been for French people an object of pride for centuries. The French language is a dialect derived from Latin and heavily influenced principally by Celtic. Today, French schools emphasize the study of novels, theater, the literary arts are heavily sponsored by the state and literary prizes are major news. The Académie française and the Institut de France are important linguistic and artistic institutions in France, Literature matters deeply to the people of France and plays an important role in their sense of identity. As of 2006, French literary people have been awarded more Nobel Prizes in Literature than novelists, poets and essayists of any other country, a writer must refuse to allow himself to be transformed into an institution, even if it takes place in the most honorable form. For most of the 20th century, French authors had more Literature Nobel Prizes than those of any other nation. M. G, le Clézio 2014 – Patrick Modiano Grand Prix de Littérature Policière – created in 1948, for crime and detective fiction. Grand Prix du roman de lAcadémie française – created 1918, Prix Décembre – created in 1989. Prix Femina – created 1904, decided each year by an exclusively female jury, Prix Goncourt – created 1903, given to the author of the best and most imaginative prose work of the year. Prix Goncourt des Lycéens – created in 1987, Prix Littéraire Valery Larbaud – created in 1957. Prix Médicis – created 1958, awarded to an author whose fame does not yet match their talent, Prix Renaudot – created in 1926. Prix Tour-Apollo Award – 1972–1990, given to the best science fiction published in French during the preceding year. Prix des Deux Magots – created in 1933, a short history of French literature Burgwinkle, William, Nicholas Hammond, and Emma Wilson, eds. The Cambridge history of French literature Cobb, Richard, Promenades, an appreciation of modern French literature Harvey, Paul. The Oxford companion to French literature Denis Hollier, ed, a New History of French Literature, Harvard University Press,1989,1150 pp. France, Peter
2.
Medieval French literature
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Medieval French literature is, for the purpose of this article, literature written in Oïl languages during the period from the eleventh century to the end of the fifteenth century. For historical background, see History of France, France in the Middle Ages or Middle Ages, for other national literary traditions, see Medieval literature. The language in southern France is known as langue doc or the Occitan language family, also known under the name of one of iys dialects, the Western peninsula of Brittany spoke Breton, a Celtic language. Catalan was spoken in the South, and Germanic languages and Franco-Provençal were spoken in the East, the various dialects of Old French developed into what are recognised as regional languages today. Languages which developed from dialects of Old French include Bourguignon, Champenois, Franc-Comtois, Francien, Gallo, Lorrain, Norman, Anglo-Norman, Picard, Poitevin, Saintongeais and Walloon. From 1340 to the beginning of the century, a generalized French language became clearly distinguished from the other competing Oïl languages. This is referred to as Middle French, the vast majority of literary production in Old French is in verse, the development of prose as a literary form was a late phenomenon. The French language does not have a significant stress accent or long and this means that the French metric line is not determined by the number of beats, but by the number of syllables. The most common lengths are the ten-syllable line, the eight-syllable line. Verses could be combined in a variety of ways, blocks of assonanced lines are called laisses, the choice of verse form was generally dictated by the genre. The Old French epics are written in ten-syllable assonanced laisses. The earliest extant French literary texts date from the ninth century, the first literary works written in Old French were saints lives. The Canticle of Saint Eulalie, written in the half of the ninth century, is generally accepted as the first such text. It is a poem that recounts the martyrdom of a young girl. The best known of the early Old French saints lives is the Vie de Saint Alexis, the life of Saint Alexis, a translation/rewriting of a Latin legend. Saint Alexis fled from his familys home in Rome on his wedding night and dwelled as a hermit in Syria until a mystical voice began telling people of his holiness. In order to avoid the earthly honor that came with such fame, he left Syria and was back to Rome. He was only identified later when the pope read his name in a letter held in the saints hand
3.
17th-century French literature
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In reality, 17th-century French literature encompasses far more than just the classicist masterpieces of Jean Racine and Madame de La Fayette. In Renaissance France, literature was largely the product of encyclopaedic humanism, a new conception of nobility, modelled on the Italian Renaissance courts and their concept of the perfect courtier, was beginning to evolve through French literature. In the mid-17th century, there were an estimated 2,200 authors in France, under Cardinal Richelieu, patronage of the arts and literary academies increasingly came under the control of the monarchy. Henry IVs court was considered by contemporaries a rude one, lacking the Italianate sophistication of the court of the Valois kings, the court also lacked a queen, who traditionally served as a focus of a nations authors and poets. Henrys literary tastes were largely limited to the chivalric novel Amadis of Gaul, in the 1620s, the most famous salon was held at the Hôtel de Rambouillet by Madame de Rambouillet, a rival gathering was organized by Madeleine de Scudéry. The word salon first appeared in French in 1664 from the Italian word sala, before 1664, literary gatherings were often called by the name of the room in which they occurred -- cabinet, réduit, alcôve, and ruelle. For instance, the term derives from literary gatherings held in the bedroom. Nobles, lying on their beds, would receive close friends, ruelle refers to the space between a bed and the wall in a bedroom, it became a name for these gatherings, often under the wing of educated women in the first half of the 17th century. In the context of French scholastica, academies were scholarly societies which monitored, fostered, academies first appeared in France during the Renaissance, when Jean-Antoine de Baïf created one devoted to poetry and music, inspired by the academy of Italian Marsilio Ficino. The first half of the 17th century was marked by a growth in private academies. Academies were generally more formal and more focused on criticism and analysis than salons, however, certain salons were closer to the academic spirit. In the mid-17th century, academies gradually came under government control and sponsorship, the first private academy to fall under governmental control was LAcadémie française, which remains the most prestigious governmental academy in France. Founded in 1634 by Cardinal Richelieu, LAcadémie française focuses on the French language, in certain instances, the values of 17th-century nobility played a major part in the literature of the era. Most notable of these values are the aristocratic obsession with glory, the spectacle of power, prestige and luxury found in 17th-century literature may be distasteful or even offensive. The château of Versailles, court ballets, noble portraits, triumphal arches – all of these were representations of glory, the notion of glory was not vanity or boastfulness or hubris, but rather a moral imperative for the aristocracy. Nobles were required to be generous, magnanimous and to great deeds disinterestedly. Ones status in the world demanded appropriate externalisation, nobles indebted themselves to build prestigious urban mansions and to buy clothes, paintings, silverware, dishes and other furnishings befitting their rank. They were also required to show generosity by hosting sumptuous parties, conversely, social parvenus who took on the external trappings of the noble classes were severely criticised, sometimes by legal action
4.
18th-century French literature
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In common with a similar movement in England at the same time, the writers of 18th century France were critical, skeptical and innovative. Their lasting contributions were the ideas of liberty, toleration, humanitarianism, equality, and progress, the 18th century saw the gradual weakening of the absolute monarchy constructed by Louis XIV. France was forced to recognize the power of England and Prussia. The Monarchy finally ended with King Louis XVI, who was unable to understand or control the forces of the French Revolution. The new class began to challenge the cultural and social monopoly of the aristocracy, French cities began to have their own theaters, coffee houses and salons, the Rise of the Third Estate culminated in their political victory in the French Revolution. Faith in science and progress was the force behind the first French Encyclopedia of Denis Diderot. The Protestants achieved legal status in France in 1787, the exchange of ideas with other countries also increased. British ideas were important, particularly such ideas as constitutional monarchy and romanticism. Toward the end of the century, a sober style appeared, aimed at illustrating scenery, work. These writers, and others such as the Abbé Sieyès, one of the authors of the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen. They came from the upper class or Third Estate, sought a society founded upon talent and merit. Their ideas were influenced by those of John Locke in England. They introduced the values of liberty and equality which became the ideals of the French Republic founded at the end of the century and they defended the freedom of conscience and challenged the role of religious institutions in society. For them, tolerance was a value of society. When the Convention placed the ashes of Voltaire in the Pantheon in Paris, while the philosophes had widely different approaches, they all had as a common objective, both for mankind and for individuals, the ideal of happiness. Some, like Rousseau, dreamed of the happiness of the savage, rapidly disappearing, others, like Voltaire. The philosophes were optimists, and they saw their mission clearly, they did not simply observe, the comedies of Marivaux and of Beaumarchais also played a part in this debate about and diffusion of great ideas. The relaxing of morals under the French Regency brought the return in 1716 of the Comédie-Italienne and his major works include Les Fausses Confidences, le Jeu de lamour et du hasard, and lÎle des esclaves
5.
19th-century French literature
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19th-century French literature concerns the developments in French literature during a dynamic period in French history that saw the rise of Democracy and the fitful end of Monarchy and Empire. French literature enjoyed enormous prestige and success in the 19th century. The first part of the century was dominated by Romanticism, until around the mid-century Realism emerged, in the last half of the century, naturalism, parnassian poetry, and symbolism, among other styles, were often competing tendencies at the same time. Some writers did form into literary groups defined by a name, in other cases, these expressions were merely pejorative terms given by critics to certain writers or have been used by modern literary historians to group writers of divergent projects or methods. Nevertheless, these labels can be useful in describing broad historical developments in the arts and their influence was felt in theatre, poetry, prose fiction. Foreign influences played a big part in this, especially those of Shakespeare, Sir Walter Scott, Byron, Goethe, Le mal du siècle, a sense of loss, disillusion, and aporia, typified by melancholy and lassitude. Romanticism in England and Germany largely predate French romanticism, although there was a kind of pre-romanticism in the works of Senancour and Jean-Jacques Rousseau at the end of the 18th century. French Romanticism took definite form in the works of François-René de Chateaubriand and Benjamin Constant and it found early expression also in the sentimental poetry of Alphonse de Lamartine. The major battles of romanticism in France was in the theater, the dramatic unities of time and place were abolished, tragic and comic elements appeared together and metrical freedom was won. Marked by the plays of Friedrich Schiller, the romantics often chose subjects from historic periods, victor Hugo was the outstanding genius of the Romantic School and its recognized leader. He was prolific alike in poetry, drama, and fiction, all three also wrote novels and short stories, and Musset won a belated success with his plays. Alexandre Dumas, père wrote The Three Musketeers and other novels in an historical setting. Prosper Mérimée and Charles Nodier were masters of shorter fiction, Romanticism is associated with a number of literary salons and groups, the Arsenal, the Cénacle, the salon of Louis Charles Delescluze, the salon of Antoine Deschamps, the salon of Madame de Staël. Romanticism in France defied political affiliation, one finds both liberal, conservative and socialist strains, the expression Realism, when applied to literature of the 19th century, implies the attempt to depict contemporary life and society. The growth of realism is linked to the development of science, history, honoré de Balzac is the most prominent representative of 19th century realism in fiction. His La Comédie humaine, a vast collection of nearly 100 novels, was the most ambitious scheme ever devised by a writer of fiction—nothing less than a contemporary history of his countrymen. Realism also appears in the works of Alexandre Dumas, fils, similar tendencies appeared in the theatrical melodramas of the period and, in an even more lurid and gruesome light, in the Grand Guignol at the end of the century. In addition to melodramas, popular and bourgeois theater in the mid-century turned to realism in the well-made bourgeois farces of Eugène Marin Labiche, from the 1860s on, critics increasingly speak of literary Naturalism
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Rome
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Rome is a special comune and the capital of Italy. Rome also serves as the capital of the Lazio region, with 2,873,598 residents in 1,285 km2, it is also the countrys largest and most populated comune and fourth-most populous city in the European Union by population within city limits. It is the center of the Metropolitan City of Rome, which has a population of 4.3 million residents, the city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, within Lazio, along the shores of the Tiber. Romes history spans more than 2,500 years, while Roman mythology dates the founding of Rome at only around 753 BC, the site has been inhabited for much longer, making it one of the oldest continuously occupied sites in Europe. The citys early population originated from a mix of Latins, Etruscans and it was first called The Eternal City by the Roman poet Tibullus in the 1st century BC, and the expression was also taken up by Ovid, Virgil, and Livy. Rome is also called the Caput Mundi, due to that, Rome became first one of the major centres of the Italian Renaissance, and then the birthplace of both the Baroque style and Neoclassicism. Famous artists, painters, sculptors and architects made Rome the centre of their activity, in 1871 Rome became the capital of the Kingdom of Italy, and in 1946 that of the Italian Republic. Rome has the status of a global city, Rome ranked in 2014 as the 14th-most-visited city in the world, 3rd most visited in the European Union, and the most popular tourist attraction in Italy. Its historic centre is listed by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site, monuments and museums such as the Vatican Museums and the Colosseum are among the worlds most visited tourist destinations with both locations receiving millions of tourists a year. Rome hosted the 1960 Summer Olympics and is the seat of United Nations Food, however, it is a possibility that the name Romulus was actually derived from Rome itself. As early as the 4th century, there have been alternate theories proposed on the origin of the name Roma. There is archaeological evidence of occupation of the Rome area from approximately 14,000 years ago. Evidence of stone tools, pottery and stone weapons attest to about 10,000 years of human presence, several excavations support the view that Rome grew from pastoral settlements on the Palatine Hill built above the area of the future Roman Forum. Between the end of the age and the beginning of the Iron age. However, none of them had yet an urban quality, nowadays, there is a wide consensus that the city was gradually born through the aggregation of several villages around the largest one, placed above the Palatine. All these happenings, which according to the excavations took place more or less around the mid of the 8th century BC. Despite recent excavations at the Palatine hill, the view that Rome has been indeed founded with an act of will as the legend suggests in the middle of the 8th century BC remains a fringe hypothesis. Traditional stories handed down by the ancient Romans themselves explain the earliest history of their city in terms of legend and myth
7.
Paris
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Paris is the capital and most populous city of France. It has an area of 105 square kilometres and a population of 2,229,621 in 2013 within its administrative limits, the agglomeration has grown well beyond the citys administrative limits. By the 17th century, Paris was one of Europes major centres of finance, commerce, fashion, science, and the arts, and it retains that position still today. The aire urbaine de Paris, a measure of area, spans most of the Île-de-France region and has a population of 12,405,426. It is therefore the second largest metropolitan area in the European Union after London, the Metropole of Grand Paris was created in 2016, combining the commune and its nearest suburbs into a single area for economic and environmental co-operation. Grand Paris covers 814 square kilometres and has a population of 7 million persons, the Paris Region had a GDP of €624 billion in 2012, accounting for 30.0 percent of the GDP of France and ranking it as one of the wealthiest regions in Europe. The city is also a rail, highway, and air-transport hub served by two international airports, Paris-Charles de Gaulle and Paris-Orly. Opened in 1900, the subway system, the Paris Métro. It is the second busiest metro system in Europe after Moscow Metro, notably, Paris Gare du Nord is the busiest railway station in the world outside of Japan, with 262 millions passengers in 2015. In 2015, Paris received 22.2 million visitors, making it one of the top tourist destinations. The association football club Paris Saint-Germain and the rugby union club Stade Français are based in Paris, the 80, 000-seat Stade de France, built for the 1998 FIFA World Cup, is located just north of Paris in the neighbouring commune of Saint-Denis. Paris hosts the annual French Open Grand Slam tennis tournament on the red clay of Roland Garros, Paris hosted the 1900 and 1924 Summer Olympics and is bidding to host the 2024 Summer Olympics. The name Paris is derived from its inhabitants, the Celtic Parisii tribe. Thus, though written the same, the name is not related to the Paris of Greek mythology. In the 1860s, the boulevards and streets of Paris were illuminated by 56,000 gas lamps, since the late 19th century, Paris has also been known as Panam in French slang. Inhabitants are known in English as Parisians and in French as Parisiens and they are also pejoratively called Parigots. The Parisii, a sub-tribe of the Celtic Senones, inhabited the Paris area from around the middle of the 3rd century BC. One of the areas major north-south trade routes crossed the Seine on the île de la Cité, this place of land and water trade routes gradually became a town
8.
Louvre Palace
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The Louvre Palace is a former royal palace located on the Right Bank of the Seine in Paris, between the Tuileries Gardens and the church of Saint-Germain lAuxerrois. Its present structure has evolved in stages since the 16th century, in 1793 part of the Louvre became a public museum, now the Musée du Louvre, which has expanded to occupy most of the building. The Palace is situated in the right-bank of the River Seine between Rue de Rivoli to the north and the Quai François Mitterrand to the south. To the west is the Jardin des Tuileries and, to the east, the Rue de lAmiral de Coligny, where its most architecturally famous façade, the Louvre Colonnade, the Cour Napoléon and Cour du Carrousel are separated by the street known as the Place du Carrousel. Some 51,615 sq m in the complex are devoted to public exhibition floor space. The Old Louvre occupies the site of the 12th-century fortress of King Philip Augustus and its foundations are viewable in the basement level as the Medieval Louvre department. This structure was razed in 1546 by King Francis I in favour of a royal residence which was added to by almost every subsequent French monarch. King Louis XIV, who resided at the Louvre until his departure for Versailles in 1678, completed the Cour Carrée, the Old Louvre is a quadrilateral approximately 160 m on a side consisting of 8 ailes which are articulated by 8 pavillons. With it, the last external vestiges of the medieval Louvre were demolished, the New Louvre is the name often given to the wings and pavilions extending the Palace for about 500 m westwards on the north and on the south sides of the Cour Napoléon and Cour du Carrousel. This consummation only lasted a few years, however, as the Tuileries was burned in 1871, the northern limb of the new Louvre consists of three great pavilions along the Rue de Rivoli, the Pavillon de la Bibliothèque, Pavillon de Rohan and Pavillon de Marsan. As on the side, three inside pavilions and their wings define three more subsidiary Courts, Cour du Sphinx, Cour Viconti and Cour Lefuel. The Chinese American architect I. M. Pei was selected in 1983 to design François Mitterrands Grand Louvre Project. The ground-level entrance to this complex was situated in the centre of the Cour Napoléon and is crowned by the prominent steel-and-glass pyramid, in a proposal by Kenneth Carbone, the nomenclature of the wings of the Louvre was simplified in 1987 to reflect the Grand Louvres organization. This allows the visitor to avoid becoming totally mystified at the bewildering array of named wings. The origin of the name Louvre is unclear, the French historian Henri Sauval, probably writing in the 1660s, stated that he had seen in an old Latin-Saxon glossary, Leouar is translated castle and thus took Leouar to be the origin of Louvre. According to Keith Briggs, Sauvals theory is often repeated, even in recent books, but this glossary has never seen again. Briggs suggests that H. J. Wolfs proposal in 1969 that Louvre derives instead from Latin Rubras, david Hanser, on the other hand, reports that the word may come from French louveterie, a place where dogs were trained to chase wolves. In 1190 King Philip II Augustus, who was about to leave on the Third Crusade, completed in 1202, the new fortress was situated in what is now the southwest quadrant of the Cour Carrée
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Tuileries Palace
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The Tuileries Palace was a royal and imperial palace in Paris which stood on the right bank of the River Seine. It was the usual Parisian residence of most French monarchs, from Henry IV to Napoleon III, built in 1564, it was gradually extended until it closed off the western end of the Louvre courtyard and displayed an immense façade of 266 metres. After the accidental death of Henry II of France in 1559 and she sold the medieval Hôtel des Tournelles, where her husband had died, and began building the palace of Tuileries in 1564, using architect Philibert de lOrme. The name derives from the tile kilns or tuileries which had occupied the site. The palace was formed by a range of long, narrow buildings. During the reign of Henry IV, the building was enlarged to the south, so it joined the long gallery, the Grande Galerie. During the reign of Louis XIV major changes were made to the Tuileries Palace, from 1659 to 1661 it was extended to the north by the addition of the Théâtre des Tuileries. From 1664 to 1666 the architect Louis Le Vau and his assistant François dOrbay made other significant changes, a new grand staircase was installed in the entrance of the north wing of the palace, and lavishly decorated royal apartments were constructed in the south wing. The kings rooms were on the floor, facing toward the Louvre. At the same time, Louis gardener, André Le Nôtre, the Court moved into the Tuileries Palace in November 1667, but left in 1672, and soon thereafter went to the Palace of Versailles. The Tuileries Palace was virtually abandoned and used only as a theatre, the boy-king Louis XV was moved from Versailles to the Tuileries Palace on 1 January 1716, four months after ascending to the throne. He moved back to Versailles on 15 June 1722, three months before his coronation, both moves were made at the behest of the Regent, the duc dOrléans. The king also resided at the Tuileries for short periods during the 1740s, on 6 October 1789, during the French Revolution, Louis XVI and his family were forced to leave Versailles and brought to the Tuileries where they were kept under surveillance. For the next two years the palace remained the residence of the king. The Tuileries covered riding ring, the Salle du Manège, home to the royal equestrian academy, the royal family tried to escape after dark, on 20 June 1791, but were captured at Varennes and brought back to the Tuileries. The Paris National Guard defended the King, but the daughter of King Louis XVI claimed that many of the guard were already in favor of the revolution, in November 1792, the Armoire de fer incident took place at the Tuileries palace. This was the discovery of a place at the royal apartments. The incident created a scandal that served to discredit the King
10.
Cardinal Richelieu
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Cardinal Armand Jean du Plessis, Duke of Richelieu and Fronsac, commonly referred to as Cardinal Richelieu, was a French clergyman, nobleman, and statesman. He was consecrated as a bishop in 1607 and was appointed Foreign Secretary in 1616, Richelieu soon rose in both the Catholic Church and the French government, becoming a cardinal in 1622, and King Louis XIIIs chief minister in 1624. He remained in office until his death in 1642, he was succeeded by Cardinal Mazarin, Cardinal de Richelieu was often known by the title of the kings Chief Minister or First Minister. He sought to consolidate power and crush domestic factions. By restraining the power of the nobility, he transformed France into a strong and his chief foreign policy objective was to check the power of the Austro-Spanish Habsburg dynasty, and to ensure French dominance in the Thirty Years War that engulfed Europe. Although he was a cardinal, he did not hesitate to make alliances with Protestant rulers in attempting to achieve his goals. While a powerful figure, events like the Day of the Dupes show that in fact he very much depended on the kings confidence to keep this power. As alumnus of the University of Paris and headmaster of the Collège de Sorbonne, Richelieu was also famous for his patronage of the arts, most notably, he founded the Académie Française, the learned society responsible for matters pertaining to the French language. Richelieu is also known by the sobriquet lÉminence rouge, from the red shade of a cardinals clerical dress and this in part allowed the colony to eventually develop into the heartland of Francophone culture in North America. He is also a character in The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas. Born in Paris, Armand du Plessis was the fourth of five children, at the age of nine, young Richelieu was sent to the College of Navarre in Paris to study philosophy. Thereafter, he began to train for a military career and his private life seems to have been typical of a young officer of the era, in 1605, aged twenty, he was treated by Théodore de Mayerne for gonorrhea. King Henry III had rewarded Richelieus father for his participation in the Wars of Religion by granting his family the bishopric of Luçon. The family appropriated most of the revenues of the bishopric for private use, they were, however, challenged by clergymen, to protect the important source of revenue, Richelieus mother proposed to make her second son, Alphonse, the bishop of Luçon. Alphonse, who had no desire to become a bishop, became instead a Carthusian monk, thus, it became necessary that the younger Richelieu join the clergy. He had strong interests, and threw himself into studying for his new post. In 1606 King Henry IV nominated Richelieu to become Bishop of Luçon, as Richelieu had not yet reached the canonical minimum age, it was necessary that he journey to Rome for a special dispensation from the Pope. This secured, Richelieu was consecrated bishop in April 1607, soon after he returned to his diocese in 1608, Richelieu was heralded as a reformer
11.
Palais-Royal
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The Palais-Royal, originally called the Palais-Cardinal, is a palace located in the 1st arrondissement of Paris. The screened entrance court faces the Place du Palais-Royal, opposite the Louvre, the larger inner courtyard, the Cour dHonneur, has since 1986 contained Daniel Burens site-specific art piece Les Deux Plateaux, known as Les Colonnes de Buren. In 1830 the Cour dHonneur was enclosed to the north by what was probably the most famous of Pariss covered arcades, demolished in the 1930s, its flanking rows of columns still stand between the Cour dHonneur and the popular Palais-Royal Gardens. Originally called the Palais-Cardinal, the palace was the residence of Cardinal Richelieu. The architect Jacques Lemercier began his design in 1629, construction commenced in 1633 and was completed in 1639, upon Richelieus death in 1642 the palace became the property of the King and acquired the new name Palais-Royal. After Louis XIII died the year, it became the home of the Queen Mother Anne of Austria and her young sons Louis XIV and Philippe, duc dAnjou. From 1649, the palace was the residence of the exiled Henrietta Maria and Henrietta Anne Stuart, wife, the two had escaped England in the midst of the English Civil War and were sheltered by Henrietta Marias nephew, King Louis XIV. Henrietta Anne was later married to Louis younger brother, Philippe de France, the following year the new duchesse dOrléans gave birth to a daughter, Marie Louise dOrléans, inside the palace. After their marriage, the became the main residence of the House of Orléans. The Duchess created the gardens of the palace, which were said to be among the most beautiful in Paris. Under the new couple, the Palais-Royal would become the social center of the capital. The court gatherings at the Palais-Royal were famed all around the capital as well as all of France and it was at these parties that the crème de la crème of French society came to see and be seen. Guests included the members of the royal family like the Queen Mother, Anne of Austria, the duchesse de Montpensier, the Princes de Condé. Philippes favourites were also frequent visitors, the palace was redecorated and new apartments were created for the maids and staff of the Duchess. After Henrietta Anne died in 1670 the Duke took a wife, the Princess Palatine. Saint-Cloud thus became the residence of her eldest son and the heir to the House of Orléans. For the convenience of the bride, new apartments were built and it was at this time that Philippe commissioned the gallery for his famous Orleans Collection of paintings, which was easily accessible to the public. The architect was Jules Hardouin-Mansart, and the cost of reconstruction was totaled to be 400,000 livres
12.
Salon (gathering)
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These gatherings often consciously followed Horaces definition of the aims of poetry, either to please or to educate. Salons, commonly associated with French literary and philosophical movements of the 17th and 18th centuries, were carried on until as recently as the 1940s in urban settings, the salon was an Italian invention of the 16th century which flourished in France throughout the 17th and 18th centuries. The salon continued to flourish in Italy throughout the 19th century, one important place for the exchange of ideas was the salon. The word salon first appeared in France in 1664, Literary gatherings before this were often referred to by using the name of the room in which they occurred, like cabinet, réduit, ruelle and alcôve. Before the end of the 17th century, these gatherings were held in the bedroom. This practice may be contrasted with the formalities of Louis XIVs petit lever. She established the rules of etiquette of the salon which resembled the earlier codes of Italian chivalry, the historiography of the salons is far from straightforward. The salons have been studied in depth by a mixture of feminist, Marxist, each of these methodologies focus on different aspects of the salons, and thus have varying analyses of the salons’ importance in terms of French history and the Enlightenment as a whole. Major historiographical debates focus on the relationship between the salons and the sphere, as well as the role of women within the salons. Breaking down the salons into historical periods is complicated due to the various historiographical debates that surround them, most studies stretch from the early 16th century up until around the end of the 18th century. Goodman is typical in ending her study at the French Revolution where, she writes, Steven Kale is relatively alone in his recent attempts to extend the period of the salon up until Revolution of 1848. This world did not disappear in 1789, as recently as the 1940s, salons hosted by Gertrude Stein gained notoriety for including Pablo Picasso and other twentieth-century luminaries like Alice B. The content and form of the salon to some extent defines the character, contemporary literature about the salons is dominated by idealistic notions of politesse, civilité and honnêteté, but whether the salons lived up to these standards is matter of debate. Older texts on the salons tend to paint a picture of the salons. Today, however, this view is considered an adequate analysis of the salon. Dena Goodman claims that rather than being leisure based or schools of civilité salons were instead at the heart of the philosophic community. In short, Goodman argues, the 17th and 18th century saw the emergence of the academic, Enlightenment salons, politeness, argues Goodman, took second-place to academic discussion. The period in which salons were dominant has been labeled the age of conversation, the topics of conversation within the salons - that is, what was and was not polite to talk about - are thus vital when trying to determine the form of the salons
13.
Fronde
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The Fronde was a series of civil wars in France between 1648 and 1653, occurring in the midst of the Franco-Spanish War, which had begun in 1635. The king confronted the opposition of the princes, the nobility, the law courts, and most of the French people. The Fronde was divided into two campaigns, the Fronde of the parlements and the Fronde of the nobles, the timing of the outbreak of the Fronde des parlements, directly after the Peace of Westphalia that ended the Thirty Years War, was significant. A. Lloyd Moote argues that Cardinal Mazarin blundered into the crisis, the Fronde represented the final attempt of the French nobility to do battle with the king, and they were humiliated. The long-term result was to strengthen Royal authority, but to weaken the economy, the Fronde facilitated the emergence of absolute monarchy. The French word fronde means sling, Parisian crowds used slings to smash the windows of supporters of Cardinal Mazarin, the Fronde in the end provided an incentive for the establishment of royalist absolutism, since the disorders eventually discredited the feudal concept of liberty. The pressure that saw the traditional liberties under threat came in the form of extended and increased taxes as the Crown needed to recover from its expenditures in the recent wars. The costs of the Thirty Years War constrained Mazarins government to raise funds by means, the impôts, the taille. The nobility refused to be so taxed, based on their old liberties, or privileges, and the brunt fell upon the bourgeoisie. When Louis XIV became king in 1643, he was only a child, most historians consider that Louiss later insistence on absolutist rule and depriving the nobility of actual power was a result of these events in his childhood. The military record of the first Fronde is almost blank, the noble faction demanded the calling of an assembly of the Estates General. The nobles believed that in the Estates-General they could continue to control the element as they had in the past. The royal faction, having no army at its disposal, had to release the prisoners. But Frances signing of the Peace of Westphalia allowed the French army to return from the frontiers, the two warring parties signed the Peace of Rueil after little blood had been shed. From then on the Fronde became a story of intrigues, half-hearted warfare in a scramble for power and control of patronage, the military operations fell into the hands of war-experienced mercenaries, led by two great, and many lesser, generals. The peace of Rueil lasted until the end of 1649, the princes, received at court once more, renewed their intrigues against Mazarin. On 14 January 1650, Cardinal Mazarin, having come to an understanding with Monsieur Gondi and Madame de Chevreuse, suddenly arrested Condé, Conti, the war which followed this coup is called the Princes Fronde. This time it was Turenne, before and afterwards the most loyal soldier of his day, listening to the promptings of Madame de Longueville, he resolved to rescue her brother Condé, his old comrade in the battles of Freiburg and Nördlingen
14.
Vincent Voiture
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Vincent Voiture, French poet and writer of prose, was the son of a rich wine merchant of Amiens. He was introduced by a schoolfellow, the count Claude dAvaux, to Gaston, Duke of Orléans, although a follower of the Duke of Orléans, he won the favour of Cardinal Richelieu, and was one of the earliest members of the Académie française. He also received appointments and pensions from Louis XIII and Anne of Austria and he published nothing in book form, but his verses and his prose letters were the delight of the coteries, and were copied, handed about and admired more perhaps than the work of any contemporary. When at the desire of the duc de Montausier, nineteen poets contributed to the Guirlande de Julie, which was to decide the much-fêted Julie in favour of his suit, Voiture refused to take part. Another famous piece of his of the kind, La Belle Matineuse, is less exquisite, but still admirable. His prose letters are full of wit, and, in some cases, as in the letter on Richelieus policy. He ranks with Jean de Balzac as the director of the reform in French prose which accompanied that of Malherbe in French verse. Voitures death, on 26 May 1648, at the outbreak of the Fronde and this article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain, Chisholm, Hugh, ed. article name needed. Media related to Vincent Voiture at Wikimedia Commons Works by or about Vincent Voiture at Internet Archive
15.
Honorat de Bueil, seigneur de Racan
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Honorat de Bueil, seigneur de Racan was a French aristocrat, soldier, poet, dramatist and member of the Académie française. Racan was born at Aubigné-Racan into a noble family from the region of Tours, Maine. An orphan at the age of 13, Racan came under the protection of the Count de Bellegarde and became a page for king Henry IV of France. His education was minimal, and by his own account he learned only the rudiments of Latin, racans successes as a courtier were limited by his physical appearance and his stuttering. In 1605, he met the esteemed poet François de Malherbe at the court, in 1621 Racan participated in the Wars of Religion and his military career would continue through the next decades. Not knowing Hebrew, Racan relied on accurate French paraphrases of the sacred texts, racans acceptance speech for the Académie française Contre les Sciences, was an oration against rules and affectation, and in praise of naturalness. Racans poetry was rigorous, but he did not completely reject the authors of Renaissance and was less inflexible on the question of the three unities and he died in Paris in 1670. Guirlande de Julie Dandrey, Patrick, ed. Dictionnaire des lettres françaises, allem, Maurice, ed. Anthologie poétique française, XVIIe siècle
16.
Sonnet
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A sonnet is a poem in a specific form which originated in Italy, Giacomo da Lentini is credited with its invention. The term sonnet is derived from the Italian word sonetto, by the thirteenth century it signified a poem of fourteen lines that follows a strict rhyme scheme and specific structure. Conventions associated with the sonnet have evolved over its history, writers of sonnets are sometimes called sonneteers, although the term can be used derisively. The sonnet was created by Giacomo da Lentini, head of the Sicilian School under Emperor Frederick II, guittone dArezzo rediscovered it and brought it to Tuscany where he adapted it to his language when he founded the Siculo-Tuscan School, or Guittonian school of poetry. Other Italian poets of the time, including Dante Alighieri and Guido Cavalcanti, wrote sonnets, other fine examples were written by Michelangelo. The structure of a typical Italian sonnet of the included two parts that together formed a compact form of argument. First, the octave, forms the proposition, which describes a problem, or question, followed by a sestet, typically, the ninth line initiates what is called the turn, or volta, which signals the move from proposition to resolution. Even in sonnets that dont strictly follow the structure, the ninth line still often marks a turn by signaling a change in the tone, mood. Later, the abba, abba pattern became the standard for Italian sonnets, for the sestet there were two different possibilities, cde, cde and cdc, cdc. In time, other variants on this scheme were introduced. Petrarch typically used an abba, abba pattern for the octave, in English, both the English or Shakespearean sonnet, and the Italian Petrarchan sonnet are traditionally written in iambic pentameter. Early twentieth-century American poet Edna St. Vincent Millay also wrote mostly Petrarchan sonnets, on His Blindness by Milton, gives a sense of the Petrarchan rhyme scheme, Most Sonnets in Dantes La Vita Nuova are Petrarchan. Chapter VII gives sonnet O voi che per la via, with two sestets and two quatrains, and Ch. VIII, Morte villana, with two sestets and two quatrains and it was written by Paolo Lanfranchi da Pistoia and is addressed to Peter III of Aragon. It employs the rhyme scheme a-b-a-b, a-b-a-b, c-d-c-d-c-d and this poem is historically interesting for its information on north Italian perspectives concerning the War of the Sicilian Vespers, the conflict between the Angevins and Aragonese for Sicily. It congratulates Robert of Naples on his recent victory, there are also two poorly regarded sonnets by the Italian Dante de Maiano. By the late 17th century poets on increasingly relied on stanza forms incorporating rhymed couplets, and by the 18th century fixed-form poems – and, in particular, the resulting versification – less constrained by meter and rhyme patterns than Renaissance poetry – more closely mirrored prose. The Romantics were responsible for a return to many of the poems used during the 15th and 16th centuries. The sonnet however was used until the Parnassians brought it back into favor
17.
Isaac de Benserade
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Isaac de Benserade was a French poet. Born in Lyons-la-Forêt in the Province of Normandy, his family appears to have connected with Richelieu. He began his career with the tragedy of Cléopâtre, which was followed by four other pieces. On Richelieus death Benserade lost his pension, but became more and more a favourite at court, Benserade provided the words for the court ballets, and was, in 1674, admitted to the Academy, where he wielded considerable influence. In 1675 he provided the quatrains to accompany the thirty nine hydraulic sculpture groups depicting Aesops fables in the labyrinth of Versailles. In 1676 the failure of his Métamorphoses dOvide in the form of rondeaux gave a blow to his reputation, Benserade may be best known for his sonnet on Job. The partisans of Benserade were headed by the prince de Conti and Mlle de Scudéry, while Mme de Montausier, some years before his death, Benserade retired to Gentilly, and devoted himself to a translation of the Psalms, which he nearly completed
18.
Guirlande de Julie
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The Guirlande de Julie is a unique French manuscript of sixty-two madrigaux. The Hôtel de Rambouillet, as it was called, was frequented by renowned précieuses, writers, nobles and robins. One of its habitués, Charles de Sainte-Maure, marquis de Montausier, had been in love since 1631 with Julie dAngennes, to charm her, he decided to give her an extraordinary present. Montausier himself wrote sixteen of the madrigals, then the text was ornamentally written by the calligraphist Nicolas Jarry and the flower quoted in each poem painted by Nicolas Robert, while the binding was done by Le Gascon. The final object turned out to be one of the most extraordinary manuscripts of the century, Julie found the manuscript on her bed, upon awakening one morning of 1641. However, she let Montausier wait another four years, until 1645 and their engagement had lasted fourteen years. After becoming the possession of the Crussol-dUzès family, the manuscript was sold several times, La Guirlande de Julie is now conserved at the département des manuscrits of the Bibliothèque nationale de France. It was first published in 1729, although several poems had already appeared in various collections, frain, Irène, La Guirlande de Julie, Robert Laffont, Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris,1991, ISBN 2-221-06819-6 Lenotre, G. Le Château de Rambouillet, six siècles dHistoire, Denoël, Paris,1984, ISBN 2-207-23023-6
19.
Giambattista Marini
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Giambattista Marino was an Italian poet who was born in Naples. He is most famous for his long epic LAdone, the Cambridge History of Italian Literature thought him to be one of the greatest Italian poets of all time. He is considered the founder of the school of Marinism, later known as Secentismo or Marinismo, characterised by its use of extravagant and excessive conceits. He was widely imitated in Italy, France, Spain and other Catholic countries, including Portugal and Poland, as well as Germany, in England he was admired by John Milton and translated by Richard Crashaw. He remained the point for Baroque poetry as long as it was in vogue. In the 18th and 19th centuries, while being remembered for historical reasons, he was regarded as the source and exemplar of Baroque bad taste. Marino remained in his birthplace Naples until 1600, leading a life of pleasure after breaking off relations with his father who wanted his son to follow a career in law. These formative years in Naples were very important for the development of his poetry, even though most of his took place in the north of Italy. Marinos father was a highly cultured lawyer, from a family probably of Calabrian origin and it seems that both Marino and his father took part in private theatrical performances of their hosts plays at the house of the Della Porta brothers. But more importantly, these surroundings put Marino in direct contact with the philosophy of Della Porta. Other figures who were influential on the young Marino include Camillo Pellegrini. Pellegrini was the author of Il Carrafa overo della epica poesia, Marino himself is the protagonist of another of the prelates dialogues, Del concetto poetico. Marino gave himself up to literary studies, love affairs and a life of pleasure so unbridled that he was arrested at least twice. In this as in other ways, the path he took resembles that of another great poet of the same era with whom he was often compared. But some witnesses, who include both Marinos detractors and defenders have firmly asserted that Marino, much of whose poetry is heavily ambiguous, had homosexual tendencies. Elsewhere, the reticence of the sources on this subject is due to the persecutions to which sodomitical practices were particularly subject during the Counterreformation. Marino then fled Naples and moved to Rome, first joining the service of Melchiore Crescenzio then that of Cardinal Aldobrandini, in 1608 he moved to the court of Duke Carlo Emanuele I in Turin. This was not a time for the poet, in fact he was the victim of an assassination attempt by his rival Gaspare Murtola
20.
Jean-Louis Guez de Balzac
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Jean-Louis Guez de Balzac was a French author, best known for his epistolary essays, which were widely circulated and read in his day. He was one of the members of Académie française. Guez de Balzac was born at Angoulême and he was born in a well off bourgeois family, which also had acquired noble titles. In his youth, he studied at two Jesuit colleges in Angoulême and Poitiers, where he learned Latin well, especially rhetoric, in 1612, he met Théophile de Viau when de Viaus troupe visited Angoulême, and fled from home with the troupe. His letters to his acquaintances and to important courtiers gained him a great reputation, compliments were showered on him, and he became an habitué of the Hotel de Rambouillet. In 1624 a collection of his Lettres was published, and was received with great favour, from Chateau de Balzac, where he had retired, he continued to correspond with Jean Chapelain, Valentin Conrart and others. In 1634 Balzac was elected to the Académie française and he died at Angoulême twenty years later. Guez de Balzacs fame rests chiefly upon the Lettres, a collection of which appeared in 1636. Recueil de nouvelles lettres was printed in the next year, Balzac has thus the credit of executing in French prose a reform parallel to Francois de Malherbes in verse. In 1631 he published a eulogy of King Louis XIII of France entitled Le Prince, in 1652 the Socrate chrétien, since 1962, his name is given to the Lycée Guez-de-Balzac in Angoulême. Works by or about Jean-Louis Guez de Balzac at Internet Archive
21.
Roger de Rabutin, Comte de Bussy
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Roger de Rabutin, Comte de Bussy, commonly known as Bussy-Rabutin, was a French memoirist. He was the cousin and frequent correspondent of Madame de Sévigné, born at Epiry, near Autun, he represented a family of distinction in Burgundy, and his father, Léonor de Rabutin, was lieutenant general of the province of Nivernais. Roger was the son, but by the death of his elder brothers became the representative of the family. He studied first at the Jesuit school in Autun, and then at the College de Clermont and he left to enter the army when he was only sixteen and fought in several campaigns, succeeding his father in the office of mestre de camp. He participated in the 1634 siege of La Mothe-en-Bassigny in Lorraine under the direction of maréchal de La Force and he himself tells us that his two ambitions were to become honnête homme and to distinguish himself in arms, but luck was against him. In 1641 he was sent to the Bastille by Richelieu for some months as a punishment for neglect of his duties in his pursuit of gallantry, in 1643 he married a cousin, Gabrielle de Toulongeon, and for a short time he left the army. But in 1645 he succeeded to his fathers position in the Nivernais and his wife died in 1646, and he became more notorious than ever through an attempt to abduct Madame de Miramion, a rich widow. This affair was settled with some difficulty by a payment on Bussys part. When Condé joined the party of the Fronde Bussy joined him and he fought with some distinction both in the civil war and on foreign service and, buying the commission of mestre de camp in 1655, he went on to serve under Turenne in Flanders. In the year 1659 he fell into disgrace for having taken part in an orgy at Roissy near Paris during Holy Week, which caused great scandal. Although Bussy denied the charges, it was said that he had not spared the reputations of members of the family, including Madame. In a letter of apology and explanation to the king Bussy claimed that a friend who had asked to borrow it briefly had copied it. The king, angry at the report, was momentarily appeased when Bussy showed him the manuscript to disprove the scandal. He was sent to the Bastille on 17 April 1665, where he remained for more than a year, and he was liberated on condition of retiring to his estates. Bussy felt the disgrace keenly, but the close of his military career was still more bitter. In 1682 he was allowed to revisit the court, but the coldness of his reception there made his provincial exile seem preferable and he returned to Burgundy and he had been elected to the Académie française in 1665, and held his chair there until his death in 1693. His Mémoires, published after his death, are likewise lively, the literary and historical student, therefore, owes Bussy some thanks. He also wrote a series of biographies for the use of his children and this article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain, Chisholm, Hugh, ed. Bussy, Roger de Rabutin
22.
Jean Chapelain
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Jean Chapelain was a French poet and critic during the Grand Siècle, best known for his role as an organizer and founding member of the Académie française. Chapelain acquired considerable prestige as a critic, but his own major work. His father wanted him to become a notary, but his mother, at an early age Chapelain began to qualify himself for literature, learning, under Nicolas Bourbon, and French and teaching himself Japanese and Spanish. De la Trousse, grand provost of France and his first published work was a preface for the Adone of Giambattista Marino, who printed and published that notorious poem at Paris. It was followed by a translation of Mateo Alemáns novel, Guzmán de Alfarache and by four extremely indifferent odes, one of them addressed to Cardinal Richelieu. The credit of introducing the law of the dramatic unities into French literature has been claimed for many writers, and especially for the Abbé dAubignac, whose Pratique du théâtre appeared in 1657. In 1656 he published, in a magnificent format, the first twelve cantos of his epic on Joan of Arc, La Pucelle. Six editions of the poem were disposed of in eighteen months and this was the end of the poetic reputation of Chapelain, the legist of Parnassus. Later the slashing satire of Nicolas Boileau-Despréaux resulted in Chapelain taking his place among the failures of modern art. Chapelains reputation as a critic survived, and in 1663 he was employed by Colbert to draw up an account of men of letters. In this pamphlet, as in his letters, he shows to far greater advantage than in his unfortunate epic, to him the young Jean Racine was indebted not only for advice, but also for the pension of six hundred livres which was so useful to him. The catholicity of Chapelains taste is shown by his De la lecture des vieux romans, in which he praises the chanson de geste, guirlande de Julie This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain, Chisholm, Hugh, ed. Chapelain, Jean. George Saintsburys History of Criticism, ii, 256-261, a very favourable assessment of Chapelain as a critic Robert Southeys Joan of Arc, an analysis of La Pucelle is given on pp. 23–79 Les Lettres de Jean Chapelain Lettres inédites
23.
Valentin Conrart
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Valentin Conrart was a French author, and as a founder of the Académie française, the first occupant of seat 2. He was born in Paris of Calvinist parents, and was educated for business, however, after his fathers death in 1620, he began to move in literary circles, and soon acquired a reputation, though he wrote nothing for many years. He was made councillor and secretary to the king, and in 1629 his house became the resort of a group who met to talk over literary subjects, cardinal Richelieu offered the society his protection, and in this way the Académie française was created. Its first meetings were held in Conrarts house and he was unanimously elected secretary, and discharged the duties of his post for forty-three years, till his death. The most important of Conrarts written works is his Mémoires sur lhistoire de son temps published by Louis Monmerqué in 1825. Guirlande de Julie R. Kerviler and Édouard de Barthélemy, Conrart, sa vie et sa correspondance, C. B. Petitot, Mémoires relatifs à lhistoire de France, tome xlviii. This article incorporates text from a now in the public domain, Chisholm, Hugh, ed. Conrart. Works by or about Valentin Conrart at Internet Archive
24.
Pierre Corneille
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Pierre Corneille was a French tragedian. He is generally considered one of the three great seventeenth-century French dramatists, along with Molière and Jean Racine and he continued to write well-received tragedies for nearly forty years. Corneille was born in Rouen, Normandy, France, to Marthe Le Pesant and Pierre Corneille and his younger brother, Thomas Corneille, also became a noted playwright. He was given a rigorous Jesuit education at the Collège de Bourbon where acting on the stage was part of the training, at 18 he began to study law but his practical legal endeavors were largely unsuccessful. Corneille’s father secured two magisterial posts for him with the Rouen department of Forests and Rivers, during his time with the department, he wrote his first play. It is unknown exactly when he wrote it, but the play, the actors approved of the work and made it part of their repertoire. The play was a success in Paris and Corneille began writing plays on a regular basis and he moved to Paris in the same year and soon became one of the leading playwrights of the French stage. His early comedies, starting with Mélite, depart from the French farce tradition by reflecting the elevated language, Corneille describes his variety of comedy as une peinture de la conversation des honnêtes gens. His first true tragedy is Médée, produced in 1635, the year 1634 brought more attention to Corneille. He was selected to write verses for the Cardinal Richelieu’s visit to Rouen, the Cardinal took notice of Corneille and selected him to be among Les Cinq Auteurs. The others were Guillaume Colletet, Boisrobert, Jean Rotrou, the five were selected to realize Richelieus vision of a new kind of drama that emphasized virtue. Richelieu would present ideas, which the writers would express in dramatic form, however, the Cardinals demands were too restrictive for Corneille, who attempted to innovate outside the boundaries defined by Richelieu. This led to contention between playwright and employer, after his initial contract ended, Corneille left Les Cinq Auteurs and returned to Rouen. In the years following this break with Richelieu, Corneille produced what is considered his finest play. Le Cid is based on the play Mocedades del Cid by Guillem de Castro, both plays were based on the legend of Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar, a military figure in Medieval Spain. The original 1637 edition of the play was subtitled a tragicomedy, even though Le Cid was an enormous popular success, it was the subject of a heated argument over the norms of dramatic practice, known as the Querelle du Cid or The Quarrel of Le Cid. Cardinal Richelieus Académie française acknowledged the success, but determined that it was defective, in part because it did not respect the classical unities of time, place. The newly formed Académie was a body that asserted state control over cultural activity, although it usually dealt with efforts to standardize the French language, Richelieu himself ordered an analysis of Le Cid
25.
Jean Desmarets de Saint-Sorlin
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Jean Desmarets, Sieur de Saint-Sorlin was a French writer and dramatist. He was a member, and the first to occupy seat 4 of the Académie française in 1634. Born in Paris, Desmarets was introduced to Cardinal Richelieu, and his inclination, however, was to writing novels, and the success of his romance LAriane in 1632 led to his formal admission to a circle of writers that met at the house of Valentin Conrart. When this circle later developed into the Académie française, Desmarets became its first chancellor and his success led to official preferment, and he was made conseiller du roi, contrôleur-général de lextraordinaire des guerres, and secretary-general of the fleet of the Levant. It was at Richelieus request that he began to write for the theatre, in this genre he produced a comedy long regarded as a masterpiece, Les Visionnaires, a prose-tragedy, Erigone, and Scipion, a tragedy in verse. His long epic Clovis is noteworthy because Desmarets rejected the traditional pagan background, with this standpoint he contributed several works in defence of the moderns in the famous quarrel between the Ancients and Moderns. In his later years Desmarets devoted himself chiefly to producing a number of religious poems and he was a violent opponent of the Jansenists, against whom he wrote a Réponse à linsolente apologie de Port-Royal. He died in Paris on 28 October 1676, guirlande de Julie Jean-Claude Vuillemin, Jean Desmarets de Saint Sorlin, in L. Foisneau, ed. Dictionary of Seventeenth-Century French Philosophers,2 vols, london and New York, Thoemmes Continuum,2008. This article incorporates text from a now in the public domain, Chisholm, Hugh. Histoire de la querelle des anciens et des modernes, pp. 80–103, works by or about Jean Desmarets at Internet Archive
26.
Claude Favre de Vaugelas
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Claude Favre de Vaugelas was a Savoyard grammarian and man of letters. Although a lifelong courtier, Claude Favre was widely known by the name of one of the estates he owned as seigneur of Vaugelas. His father was the distinguished president Favre and his mother bore the name than his husband. She got the Vaugelass estate, by birth and his thorough knowledge of the French language and the correctness of his speech won him a place among the original members of the Académie française in 1634. On the representation of his colleagues his pension was restored so that he might have leisure to pursue his Remarques sur la langue française. In this work he maintained that words and expressions were to be judged by the current usage of the best society, of which, as a regular of the Hôtel de Rambouillet and he shares with François de Malherbe the credit of having purified French diction. His book fixed the current usage, and the writers of the 17th century regulated their practice by it. Protests against the doctrine were not lacking. Towards the end of his life Vaugelas became tutor to the sons of Thomas Francis of Savoy and he died in Paris in February 1650. His translation from Quintus Curtius, La Vie dAlexandre, deserves notice as an application of the authors own rules, attribution This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain, Chisholm, Hugh, ed. Vaugelas, Claude Favre, Seigneur de. Works by or about Claude Favre de Vaugelas at Internet Archive
27.
Antoine Godeau
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Antoine Godeau was a French bishop, poet and exegete. He is now known for his work of criticism Discours de la poésie chrétienne from 1633 and his verse-writing early won the interest of a relative in Paris, Valentin Conrart, at whose house the literary world gathered. The outcome of meetings was the foundation of the Académie française, of which Godeau was one of the first members. He was induced to settle in Paris, where he became a favorite at the Hôtel de Rambouillet. At that time, to say of any work cest de Godeau was to stamp it with the seal of approval. In 1636, he was named Bishop of Grasse by Richelieu, to whom he had dedicated his first religious composition, Godeau by no means gave up other interests. In 1645 and 1655 he took a prominent part in the General Assembly of the French Clergy and he was stricken with apoplexy and died in his episcopal city at the age of sixty-seven. The Jesuit poet François Vavasseur published, in 1647, a satire on Godeau, Antonius Godellus, episcopus Grassensis and his Eloges des evesques, qui dans tous les siècles de lEglise ont fleury en doctrine et en sainteté was republished in 1802 by M. Sauffret. His Histoire de lEglise was translated into Italian by Sperone Speroni and into German by Hyper and Groote, of this work Johann Baptist Alzog says that although written in an attractive and popular style, it is lacking in solid worth and original research. The same Père Le Cointe, later a friend of Godeaus, while conceding to the complete work many excellencies, calls attention to its frequent inaccuracies. Minor writings of Godeaus include LIdée du bon magistrat en la vie et en la mort de Mr de Cordes, conseiller au Chastelet de Paris and Eloges historiques des empereurs, des roys, qui dans tous les Siècles ont excellé en piété. His chief title to fame, however, rests on his work in Holy Scripture and his Version expliquée du Nouveau Testament de Nostre Seigneur Jésus-Christ is something between a literal translation and a paraphrase. In the Latin translation, which appeared at Augsburg in 1774 under the title Theologia moralis ex purissimis s, scripturæ, patrum ac conciliorum fontibus derivata, notis theologicis illustrata, the arrangement of the matter is greatly improved. Attribution This article incorporates text from a now in the public domain, Rudge. Godeau, vescovo di Vence Fauteuil 10 Works by or about Antoine Godeau at Internet Archive
28.
Madame de La Fayette
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Christened Marie-Madeleine Pioche de La Vergne, she was born in Paris to a family of minor but wealthy nobility. At 16, de la Vergne became the maid of honour to Queen Anne of Austria and began also to acquire an education from Gilles Ménage. Ménage would lead her to join the fashionable salons of Madame de Rambouillet and Madeleine de Scudéry. Her father, Marc Pioche de la Vergne, had died a year before, and the year her mother married Renaud de Sévigné, uncle of Madame de Sévigné. In 1655, de la Vergne married François Motier, comte de La Fayette and she accompanied him to country estates in Auvergne and Bourbonnais although she made frequent trips back to Paris, where she began to mix with court society and formed her own successful salon. Her sister-in-law was Louise de La Fayette, favourite of Louis XIII of France, some of her acquaintances included Henrietta of England, future Duchess of Orleans, who asked La Fayette to write her biography, Antoine Arnauld, and the leading French writers Segrais and Huet. Earlier on, during the Fronde, La Fayette had also befriended the Cardinal de Retz with whom her stepfather was associated, settling permanently in Paris in 1659, La Fayette published, anonymously, La Princesse de Montpensier in 1662. From 1665 onwards she formed a relationship with François de La Rochefoucauld, author of Maximes. 1669 saw the publication of the first volume of Zaïde, a Hispano-Moorish romance which was signed by Segrais but is almost certainly attributable to La Fayette, the second volume appeared in 1671. The title ran through reprints and translations mostly thanks to the preface Huet had offered, La Fayettes most famous novel was La Princesse de Clèves, first published anonymously in March 1678. An immense success, the work is taken to be the first true French novel. Her correspondence showed her as the acute diplomatic agent of Marie Jeanne Baptiste of Savoy-Nemours, duchess of Savoy, the death of La Rochefoucauld in 1680 and her husband in 1683 led La Fayette to lead a less active social life in her later years. Three works were published posthumously, La Comtesse de Tende, Histoire dHenriette dAngleterre and her baptism took place March 18,1634 in the Church of Saint-Sulpice. Her godfather was Urbain de Maillé-Brézé, Marshal of France, and her godmother was Marie-Madelaine de Vignerot, lady Combalet, later Duchess of Aiguillon and she married on February 15,1655 François Motier, Count de La Fayette. He held several lands in the Auvergne region such as de La Fayette, de Goutenoutouse, de Médat and de Forest. She gave him two sons, Louis de Lafayette, baptized March 7,1658, commendatory abbot of Notre-Dame de Valmont, Armand Renaud de La Fayette, Brigadier des armées, count, La Princesse de Montpensier,1662, 2nd edition 1674 and 1675. 1, vol 2, Paris, Claude Barbin,1671, La Princesse de Clèves, Paris, Claude Barbin,16 mai 1678. Romans et Nouvelles, Paris, Classiques Garnier,1989, ISSN 0750-2176, Histoire de madame Henriette dAngleterre, première femme de Philippe de France, Duc dOrléans, Amsterdam, M. -C
This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Rambouillet, Catherine de Vivonne, Marquise de". Encyclopædia Britannica. 22 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. pp. 873–874.
