Marie le Jars de Gournay

Abstract

Marie de Gournay is remembered as ``the adopted daughter of Montaigne'' and as the editor of his essays, but she was also a novelist, translator, poet, literary critic, and essayist in her own right. She lived during the reigns of five French kings: Charles IX, Henri III, Henri IV, Louis XIII, and Louis XIV. Her life was affected by the troubles, interests, and attitudes of her times. To her contemporaries she was both an object of ridicule and an object of praise. Some regarded her as an eccentric old woman who dwelt only in the past. Others who admired her goodness, wit, and intelligence, regarded her as ``the tenth Muse'' or ``the French Minerva.'' Among her friends and admirers were not only Montaigne, but also Justus Lipsius, Saint Francis de Sales, La Mothe le Vayer, Abbé de Marolles, and Cardinal Richelieu.