Danchet, Antoine

Danchet, Antoine (7 October 1671, Riom; 28 February 1748, Paris), dramatist, was born in a tailor shop. While still a youth, he interrupted his studies at the Oratorian school in his native city to go to Paris. He completed his formal education in the capital and had a Latin ode printed there in 1691. He dedicated this learned piece of poetry to Père La Chaize, and the confessor to the king was pleased enough to reward Danchet by making him a professor of rhetoric at Chartres in 1692. He…