Antoine Danchet

Antoine Danchet (born September 7, 1671 in Riom , today's Puy-de-Dôme department , † February 21, 1748 in Paris ) was a French writer.

Life

Danchet completed his school days at a school of the oratorians and later switched to Chartres ( Département Eure-et-Loir ) as a lecturer for eloquence on the recommendation of his teachers . Later he was entrusted with a teaching position at the Lycée Louis-le-Grand in Paris.

His first literary attempts date from this time and he was soon able to debut successfully with a play. Therefore, Danchet gave up his job as a teacher and from that time devoted himself only to his literary work.

1705 accepted him as a member of the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres . In this environment he learned a. a. Marie-Angelique and Claudine Guérin de Tencin , who paved many a path for him through their influence. Through their influence, Danchet was appointed by the Académie française to succeed the late Paul Tallemant in 1712 ( armchair 5 ). Jean-Baptiste Louis Gresset succeeded him in this place in 1748 .

Quote

Voltaire dedicated the following epigram to Antoine Danchet :

Danchet si méprisé jadis,

Apprend aux pauvres de génie

Qu'on peut gagner l'Académie

Comm on gagne la paradis.

Works (selection)

Individual works

• Apollon and Daphne . Paris 1698 (music by Jean-Baptiste Lully ).
• Cyrus . Paris 1706.
• Les fêtes vénitiennes . Paris 1710 (music by André Campra ).
• Les fêtes d' Euterpe . Un ballet . Paris 1758 (together with François-Augustin Paradis de Montcrif and Charles-Simon Favart ).
• Les Héraclides . Paris 1719.
• Hesione . Paris 1700 (music by André Campra).
• Idomeneo . Paris 1712 (music by André Campra ) (served Giambattista Varesco (text) and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (music) as a template for the opera Idomeneo ).
• Nitétis . Paris 1724.
• Tancrède . Paris 1701 (music by André Campra).
• Les Tyndarides . Paris 1708.

Work edition

• Théâtre de M. Danchet . Paris 1751 (4 vols.)

literature

• Marcel Laurent: Antoine Danchet . In: René Bouscayrol (ed.): Riomois célèbres ou méconnus . Presse de l'Académie, Clermont-Ferrand 1998, ISBN 2-903377-24-3 , p. 116.
• Paul Mesnard: Histoire de l'académie française depuis sa fondation jusqu'en 1830 . Charpentier, Paris 1857.
• Antoine Taillefer: Tableau historique de l'esprit et du caratère des littérateurs françois . Édition Nyon, Paris 1785 (4 vols., Here especially vol. 1).

Web links

• Literature by and about Antoine Danchet in the catalog of the German National Library
• Short biography and list of works of the Académie française (French)