Columbia Encyclopedia

(Encyclopedia) Perrault, Claude pĕrōˈ [key], 1613–88, French architect, scientist, and physician. One of the most eminent French scholars of his time, he advanced the study of anatomy and made other scientific...

(Encyclopedia) Perret, Auguste ōgüstˈ pĕrāˈ [key], 1874–1954, French architect. He left the Académie des Beaux-Arts in Paris to join the family construction firm with his brother Gustave, and began to exper...

(Encyclopedia) Boileau-Despréaux, Nicolas nēkôläˈ bwälōˈ-dāprāōˈ [key], 1636–1711, French literary critic and poet. He was the spokesman of classicism, drawing his principles from his contemporaries, a...

(Encyclopedia) Hou Hsiao-hsien, 1947–, Taiwanese film director, b. Guangdong, China. His first feature film, Cute Girl (1980), and subsequent ones were generally saccharine romances until the semibiographical A Ti...

(Encyclopedia) Rochefort, Victor Henri, marquis de Rochefort-Luçay vēktôrˈ äNrēˈ rôshfôrˈ märkēˈ də rôshfôrˈ-lüsāˈ [key], 1831–1913, French journalist and politician. The editor of Le Figaro in...

(Encyclopedia) Beaumarchais, Pierre Augustin Caron de pyĕr ōgüstăNˈ karôNˈ də bōmärshāˈ [key], 1732–99, French dramatist. Originally a watchmaker, he rose to wealth and position among the nobility. His...

(Encyclopedia) Dumas, Alexandre, known as Dumas fils fēs [key], 1824–95, French dramatist and novelist, illegitimate son of Alexandre Dumas (1802–70, Dumas Père). He was the chief creator of the 19th-century c...

(Encyclopedia) Demangeon, Albert dāmäNzhōNˈ [key], 1872–1940, French geographer, specializing in the study of regional and economic geography. His best-known works include Le Déclin de L'Europe (1920), L'Empi...

(Encyclopedia) Destouches, Philippe Néricault fēlēpˈ nārēkōˈ dāto͞oshˈ [key], 1680–1754, French dramatist. He was known for his moralistic comedies. Le Glorieux (1732, tr. 1791), his masterpiece, treats...

(Encyclopedia) Hérold, Louis Joseph Ferdinand lwē zhôzĕfˈ fĕrdēnäNˈ ārôldˈ [key], 1791–1833, French composer. He composed a number of operas, two of which—Zampa (1831) and Le Pré aux clercs (1832)�...