Perrot d'Ablancourt, Nicolas (1606-64). French translator, man of letters, and one of the early members of the Académie Française. Born a Huguenot, he converted to Catholicism at 20 but apostasized a few years later. He used much of his private income to travel in Holland and England and to study foreign and ancient languages; thereafter a need for financial independence played a role in his choice of profession. Conrart encouraged him to translate some orations of Cicero, as a result of which he was elected to the Academy in 1637. There followed, first, a major version of Tacitus, then a spate of publications based on Greek and Spanish as well as Latin originals. So free were these translations that Ménage coined the phrase ‘les belles infidèles’ to describe them; but, together with the work of Guez de Balzac, they had a major impact on the formation of classical taste in the mid-17th c. and contributed considerably to the evolution of French prose style. Another friend from the same circle, Patru, wrote his biography.

[Peter Bayley]

The New Oxford Companion to Literature in French. Copyright © 1995, 2005 by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved.