jean de la bruyère

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born August 1645, Paris, France died May 10/11, 1696, Versailles French satiric moralist. As a tutor and librarian in a royal household, he observed aristocratic idleness, fads, and fashions. His The Characters, or Manners of the Age, with the Characters of Theophrastus (1688) was appended to his translation of Theophrastus and written in the latter's style. A masterpiece of French literature, it was an indictment of the vanity and pretensions around him. Eight editions of Characters, with expanded character sketches and topical allusions, appeared through 1694