François de La Rochefoucauld: Biography from Answers.com Mobile

François VI duke de La Rochefoucauld

(born Sept. 15, 1613, Paris, France — died March 16/17, 1680, Paris) French writer. Of a noble family, he joined the army at an early age and was wounded several times. He later played a leading part in the Fronde but gradually won his way back into royal favour. He turned his energies to intellectual pursuits and became the leading exponent of the maxime, a French form of epigram that concisely expresses a harsh or paradoxical truth. Maximes (five eds., 1665 – 78), his principal achievement, consists of 500 reflections on human behaviour. His Mémoires (1664) recount the plots and campaigns of mutinous nobles during the Fronde.

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