La Sablière, Marquerite Hessein, Mme de

(1636-1693)

   writer

   Born in Paris, Marguerite Hessein, Mme de La Sablière, was gifted with a solid education and lived quite freely, separating early from her husband and presiding over a brilliant salon where she gathered together the literary society of the period. She was, beginning in 1672 and for the next 20 years, the attentive patron of jean de la fontaine, who dedicated two of his Discours to her (one on the soul of animals, the other on the occasion of his election to the Académie Française in 1684). Having abjured Protestantism, Mme de La Sablière retired in 1678 to a convent, taking as her spiritual adviser the abbé de rance, a well-known confessor and monastic reformer. She left her Lettres.