author
Nicolas Boileau Despréaux
1636–1711
A sharp-witted poet and critic of seventeenth-century France, remembered for giving French classicism some of its clearest rules and its driest humor. His satires and literary judgments shaped how generations of readers thought about taste, order, and poetic craft.
1 Audiobook
Le Lutrin, poème héroï-comique
by Nicolas Boileau Despréaux
About the author
Born in Paris in 1636, Nicolas Boileau-Despréaux studied first for the church and then in law before turning fully to literature. He became famous for his Satires, which attacked bad writing, pretension, and social foolishness with a style that was polished, direct, and often severe.
Boileau was one of the key literary voices of the age of Louis XIV. His L'Art poétique helped define the ideals of French classicism, urging clarity, balance, discipline, and respect for ancient models. He also wrote epistles, critical works, and a noted translation of Longinus, and he was admired as a powerful judge of literary taste.
Though his strict standards later made him seem austere to some readers, his influence was enormous in France and beyond. He remains an important figure for anyone interested in how poetry, criticism, and literary rules were debated in early modern Europe.