Louis-Élisabeth de la Vergne de Tressan

Portrait of Tressan by Alexandre Desenne , 1824

Louis-Élisabeth de la Vergne, Comte de Tressan (born November 4, 1705 in Le Mans or Mons , † October 31, 1782 or 1783 in Franconville) was a French writer and encyclopaedist .

Life

Tressan - the name under which he appeared as an author - came from a noble family from Languedoc and received his education together with Louis XV. In 1723 he began his military career, but spent a long time in Rome in the following years , where he dealt with old French chivalric novels. After Paris returned, he resumed his military career again. In 1733 and 1734 he was involved in campaigns. He also took part in the war campaigns in Flanders in 1741 , was temporarily adjutant to the king and finally became lieutenant general . In 1750 he also became governor of French Lorraine and Toul. He finally became Grand Marshal at the court of the exiled Polish King Stanislaus I in Lunéville . There he was accused by the king's Jesuit confessor of being a believer in philosophy; Voltaire was particularly pleased with his quick-witted answer . After Stanislaus' death Tressan withdrew to the solitude of a country estate in Champagne and devoted himself increasingly to writing.

He was married to Michelle de la Vergne de Tressan (* approx. 1720).

Tressan was friends with people like Voltaire and Fontenelle, and frequented Madame Tencin's drawing room . Tressan wrote a philosophical treatise with the title Réflexions sommaires sur l'esprit , the Essai sur le fluide électrique and numerous occasional poems; he also wrote for Diderot's Encyclopédie . In 1781, thanks to his translation of the Orlando furioso by Ariost, he became a member of the French Academy . In 1782 the four volumes of the Corps d'extraits de romans de chevalerie were published . Between 1780 and 1791 a twelve-volume complete edition of his works was published in Paris and between 1822 and 1823 his collected works were published in ten volumes by Campenon and A. Martin.

Schiller's judgment

On March 20, 1801, Friedrich Schiller wrote in a letter to Goethe that in Tressan's works one finds “instead of the naturalness of feelings [...] only the office style” and “a sentimental effect”, but that “there is a certain simplicity in the system "And a" skill in the arrangement "pleasing.

Works (selection)

• Amadis de Gaule, traduction libre (1779)
• Roland Furieux. Poème héroïque de l'Arioste (4 volumes, 1780)
• Essai sur le fluid électrique, considéré comme agent universel (2 volumes, 1786). Texts online: [1]
• Le Chevalier Robert, ou Histoire de Robert surnommé le Brave (1800)
• Rose Summers, ou les Dangers de l'imprévoyance traduit librement de l'anglais (1805)
• Œuvres (8 volumes, 1822–23)

literature

• Henri Jacoubet , Le Comte de Tressan et les Origines du genre troubadour , Paris 1923

Web links

• Literature by and about Louis-Élisabeth de la Vergne de Tressan in the catalog of the German National Library
• Short biography and list of works of the Académie française (French)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ In Herders Conversations-Lexikon the place of birth is Mons and the year of death 1783 ( Herders Conversations-Lexikon . Freiburg im Breisgau 1857, Volume 5, p. 513 ).
2. ↑ General German Real Encyclopedia for the educated estates , Vol. 10, 5th edition Leipzig (Brockhaus) 1820, p. 88 f.
3. ↑ Tressan . In: Heinrich August Pierer , Julius Löbe (Hrsg.): Universal Lexicon of the Present and the Past . 4th edition. tape 17 . Altenburg 1863, p. 793 ( zeno.org ).
4. ↑ Family genealogy
5. ↑ Short biography of the Académie française, in French ( Memento of the original from May 1, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. 
6. ↑ Tressan . In: Meyers Konversations-Lexikon . 4th edition. Volume 15, Verlag des Bibliographisches Institut, Leipzig / Vienna 1885–1892, p. 821. with unrealistic date of death.
7. ↑ Ernst Lautenbach: Lexicon of Schiller Quotes . from work and life. IUDICIUM Verlag, 2003, ISBN 3-89129-805-6 , p. 769 ( full text in Google Book Search).