AUNILLON DU GUÉ (Pierre Charles Fabiot)

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AUNILLON DU GUÉ (Pierre Charles Fabiot)
Poesies on various subjects. S.l.n.d. [c. 1745]. Manuscript in-4 (192 x 150 mm) of 137 leaves paginated from 321 to 651 (with errors) and 5 leaves of table, red morocco, triple gilt fillet, ornamented spine, green title-pieces, gilt edges (18th century binding). Unpublished autograph manuscript, with erasures and corrections, of the writer, freemason, politician and abbot, Pierre Charles Aunillon du Gué. Born in 1685 in Paris to a family of English origin, he died in 1760. He was appointed head of the abbey of Saint-Laurent du Gué de Launay in Vibraye (Sarthe), but he devoted his life to literature, worldly life and love affairs. Many details about his personality and his life are known thanks to the police reports kept in the Bastille archives, as well as his memoirs, published in 1808 under the title Mémoires de la vie galante, politique et littéraire de l'Abbé Aunillon Delaunay du Gué, ambassador of Louis XV. We know in particular that he joined Freemasonry in 1737 (Coustos-Villeroy Lodge, one of the first in France) and that he frequented the actresses of the French Theatre, where he was known as "Abbé de la Comédie". In 1744, Louis XV appointed him ambassador to the Elector of Cologne. He is the author of several works, including Les amants déguisés (1728), Azor ou le Prince enchanté (1750), Lamekis ou les Voyages extraordinaires d'un Égyptien (1787), etc. The 105 gallant, philosophical and occasional plays that make up this volume illustrate his social and amorous life and at the same time paint a picture of the society he frequented: Voltaire, Gresset, the Cardinal de Bernis, the Duc de la Force, Madame du Chatelet, Madame du Boccage, Madame Dupin, the Cardinal de Fleury, etc. The BnF and the library of the Comédie Française preserve manuscripts of the abbé Aunillon, some of them coming from the libraries of Saint-Beuve and baron Pichon. Dominique Quéro, editor of several of the writer's letters to the actress Adrienne Lecouvreur, to Voltaire and to Madame de Graffigny, points out that the study of his manuscripts would provide important material on the literary life of the 18th century.
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