Pierre Légier

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Pierre Légier (1734, in Jussey – 7 January 1791, ibid) [1]) was an 18th-century French writer, librettist, jurist and mayor. After a brief military career, he studied law in Paris and tried his luck at literature. His early verse met some success but his dramatic works did not. He then returned to his hometown to take some administrative positions (including that of mayor) without completely abandoning literature. He was received at the Académie des sciences, belles-lettres et arts de Besançon et de Franche-Comté [fr] in 1780.

Voltaire speaks of him in unflattering terms in a letter to Count of Tressan dated 3 February 1758.[2]

Works

Bibliography

  • Charles Weisse, Notice sur M. Légier, in Mémoires de la Société d'agriculture de la Haute-Saône, Vesoul, 1812, tome III, p. 251-260. L'auteur a publié une synthèse de cette notice dans la Biographie universelle, ancienne et moderne, Paris, L. G. Michaud, 1819, vol. 23, p. 569.
  • N. L. M. Desessarts et al., Les siècles littéraires de la France, Paris, chez l'auteur, an IX (1801), tome 4, p. 127.

References

  1. ^ In a letter to Count of Tressan dated 1 March 1758, Voltaire speaks of him as a priest, but this title is attested in any other known source. See Recherches sur Diderot et sur l'Encyclopédie [fr], 2001, n° 30, (p. 167).
  2. ^ Béni soit le Docteur Légier, et ses consorts et ses mauvais vers et sa sottise, puisque tout cela m'attire tant de bontez de votre part (Recherches sur Diderot et sur l'Encyclopédie, 1986, (p. 130)).
  3. ^ The première took place on 16 November 1763 at the Hôtel de Bourgogne. See Nicole Wild, David Charlton, Théâtre de l'Opéra-Comique : répertoire 1762-1972, Paris, Mardaga, 2005, (p. 384) and Anecdotes dramatiques, Paris, veuve Duchesne, 1775, tome second, (p. 125). On 22 November 1763, the opera was set up at La Monnaie in Brussels.
  4. ^ See: Roland Desné, Quand Catherine II achetait la bibliothèque de Diderot, in Raymond Trousson (dir.), Thèmes et figures du XVIIIe siècle, Droz, 1980, (p. 86–94).