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Jean Franois De Saint Lambert

Jean-Francois de Saint-Lambert
Jean-Francois de Saint-Lambert.jpg
Birth 26 December 1716
Nancy
Deaths 9 February 1803 (86 years)
Paris
Nationality Lorraine.svg Lorraine , then Flag: France France
Occupation (s) Military

Jean-Francois, Marquis de Saint-Lambert, born in Nancy on 26 December 1716 and died in Paris on 9 February 1803 , is a military , philosopher , storyteller and poet Lorraine then, after 1766 , French.

Summary

/ / Biography

Born into a wealthy noble family, but few, Jean-Francois de Saint-Lambert was educated at the college of Pont--Mousson and then served in the Guards Lorraine King Stanislas Leszczyski before becoming grand master of his wardrobe. Large, distinguished, taciturn, never laughing, refusing to flatter anyone, a little wild, women adored him.

It was noticed first by the Marquise de Boufflers , mistress of King Stanislaus, who paused for a lover. In 1746 , Saint-Lambert went to war and on his return, found that Ms. Boufflers had replaced. In an attempt to make her jealous he seduced the Marquise Emilie du Chatelet , who had just arrived at the court of Luneville.

Far from being stung, laughed Madame de Boufflers this link and was pleased to encourage him. What started as a trifle became a passion. Emilie du Chatelet, who put the excess in everything she undertook, behaved as a young girl in love, leaving notes in the strings of the harp Boufflers for Madame de Saint-Lambert should find them there. Voltaire knew the situation or pretended not to notice anything, but in any case at that time, his relationship with Saint-Lambert appears cloudless. Emilie du Chatelet finally fell pregnant by Saint-Lambert. At forty years ago, she died on 10 September 1749 , shortly after giving birth to a baby girl who did not survive him. Voltaire and Saint-Lambert were up to her last moments. It was after this tragedy that their relationship turned sour.

This cold lasted several years and then resumed their relationship. Voltaire's admiration for Saint-Lambert, which he considered as a poet, and was one of his supporters when he appeared committed to the French Academy.

After the death of Emilie du Chatelet, Saint-Lambert went to Paris and took service in the French army. He said the campaign in 1757 in Hanover , attaining the rank of colonel in the army of the King of France and, shortly thereafter, following a paralytic attack, renounced in 1758 the profession of arms to devote himself to poetry. He took the title of Marquis, befriended the Encyclopedists - mentioned as the anonymous author of the articles "pomp," "familiarity," "firmness", "flattery", "fantasy", "frivolous", "fragile" (Morals ), "frivolity & Engineering (Littrat.) of the Encyclopedia of Diderot and d'Alembert - frequented the salons ladies of Epinay , of Lespinasse , Geoffrin and the Deffand and dinners Miss Quinault. In 1752 , he began with Houdetot Sophia , who was the sister of Louise d'Epinay , and that inspired a great passion for Jean-Jacques Rousseau , an association that lasted nearly half a century.

His reputation was soon to grow in the literary and philosophical circles of the capital. It increased again when he gave in 1769 , his masterpiece, the poem of the Seasons. She opened wide the doors of the French Academy , where he was elected on 26 April 1770 to chair 10, to replace Father Trublet. Consequently, Saint-Lambert has a great influence in the Academy. Wanted and adored, he was the idol of the show Suzanne Necker.

During the French Revolution , he retired to Eaubonne with Sophia Houdetot. They called therefore "the sage of Eaubonne. In fact, he became melancholy, and even a little unsound mind, finding satisfaction only in greed. He died in 1803.

Works

He wrote poems and stories. Zimo example is a philosophical tale.

Literary Posterity

The name of Saint-Lambert is still attached to his only poem of the Seasons, which is the masterpiece of descriptive poetry of the eighteenth century. Voltaire does not hesitate to rank among the "works of genius" and says: "This is the only work of our century will go down in history." Others, like Grimm and Diderot , signaled a lack of verve and invention, the coldness of the style, abundant epithets and hollow pins. "This Saint-Lambert, wrote Madame du Deffand in Walpole, is a mind cold, bland and false it feels full of ideas, and it is the same sterility; without birds, streams, abalone and their branches, it would have little to say. "

In both cases, it may be going a bit far. It is certain that without completely avoid drought and heavy, The Seasons, which runs through the circle into four songs of the year with weather, seasonal cycles and life, the work of the campaign, etc.. is a work extremely carefully, often brilliant, and, in some passages, reached across and real poetry. This is for example the case of the magnificent piece of "Deer Hunting"

The timid and terrified animal ran
And sees in every object that the death continues
His route on the sand is hardly marked;
He is ahead, running, seeing and thinking;
The eye follows and seeks to places he has passed away.
His cruel enemies, excited by the horn,
Stand on his feet on mountain tops,
Or melt loudly over the vast countryside.
Alarmed by the cries and screams long
Constantly in his ear brought by winds,
Unwelcome to those winds he directs his flight:
But the troupe relentless, eager in pursuit,
Grasps its better then wandering spirits.
He listens and soars, rising by leaps and bounds;
He wants or confuse or conceal his whereabouts,
Come loose sand, and fly in space.
But that he used his feints, his returns?
Lawns, thickets reveal its detours.
It reviews these woods, the scene of his glory,
Where once it yielded one hundred rivals victory
Where covered in blood, burned with desire,
Price for his courage he earned pleasures.
If he forces a young deer running across the plain,
To present his evidence to the pack uncertain
The hunter's guide will prevent the error;
What will it? trembling, sad, horrified,
Overwhelms his armor and his head is tilted;
Under his burning palace, his tongue is parched;
He stops, he hears cries more threatening,
And made to flee efforts still powerless;
His heavy eyes drop tears.
A troupe in his fury he opposes weapons:
But this vain despair serves as an instant;
He falls, he falls and dies fighting.

Saint-Lambert also gave fugitive Poems worth reading for their elegance and finesse.

Chronological list


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