Marie de Gournay (1565–1645)

Abstract

Marie le Jars de Gournay pointed out the folly and harm of using words to create false myths to authenticate women’s ridicule and exclusion. Her involvement with the great language debate of her time, her translations and editing, her compositions in prose and poetry—all gave her expertise and authority to champion against those who, she discerned, made rules unreasonable and harmful to women. Born on October 6, 1565, Marie de Gournay experienced the golden age of French literature during the reigns of Charles IX, Henri III, IV, Louis XIII and Cardinal Richelieu. Residing in Picardy and in Paris, de Gournay participated in the intellectual activity of France beginning with her editing of Michel Montaigne’s Essays. When Marie de Gournay’s father, a country nobleman, died leaving his widow to rear their six children with reduced means, Marie, the eldest, a studious child, taught herself Latin by comparing original texts with their translations, finding Greek difficult to master. De Gournay described herself as neither beautiful nor ugly, but of medium size with chestnut colored hair and a face round with clear, dark complexion; nevertheless, she was not generally considered attractive, nor well dressed.1 She chose the life of scholarship rather than of marriage. Her life ended at age 79 on July 13,1645 at the commencement of the reign of Louis XIV.