La Motte, Antoine Houdar De

La Motte, Antoine Houdar De 

Born Jan. 17, 1672, in Paris; died there Dec. 26,1731. French writer.

La Motte rejected the conventions of classicism. He is known for his relatively free verse translation of the Iliad (1714), in which he presented the Homeric heroes and gods as figures conforming to the spirit of the 18th century. In defense of his translation he wrote Reflections on Criticism (1715), which led to a revival of the controversy between the ancients and the moderns. B. Fontenelle supported La Motte in the polemic. As a playwright, La Motte was famous for his tragedy Inés de Castro (published 1723), written in the manner of Racine; its subject matter is borrowed from A. Ferreira. La Motte also wrote didactic eclogues, fables, opera librettos, and odes in prose (Odes, 1707).

WORKS

Oeuvres, vols. 1–10. Paris, 1754.

REFERENCES

Istoriia frantsuzskoi literatury, vol. 1. Moscow-Leningrad, 1946. Pages 604–05.
Dost, G. Houdar de la Motte als Tragiker und dramatischer Theoretiker. Weida, 1909.

V. S. LOZOVETSKH