Comptes rendus PFSCL LII, 102 DOI 10.24053/ PFSCL-2025-0016 233 Rémi Mathis : Le Solitaire et le Ministre : autour de la correspondance entre Arnaud d’Andilly et Arnaud de Pomponne 1642-1674. Paris, Garnier, 2024. 359 p. Before taking up the content of this book an observation came to mind: this is the most perfectly prepared and completed book that this reviewer has seen in his seventy years of reading scholarly books. The Preface and the Introduction, read together as a single engaging whole; the Introductions to each of the 95 letters are cogent and brief, and the annexes complementary to the letters, and indexes of places and persons appropriate in their level of detail. Only one unimportant oversight was found. The letters exchanged between Robert d’Andilly and his son Simon de Pomponne are certainly only one of the numerous surviving sets of letters from one side, the diplomat posted to a faraway country, and the other side, a relative at “home,” that remain unknown and unread because they are in private archives. Their owners keep them, but they do not quite know why. The letters edited here are mostly in the Bibliothèque de l’Arsenal. The themes found in the letters are primordial—health, concern for relatives other than the one to whom the letter is addressed, education, children, wives, useful contacts, and paternal warnings as well as expressions of affection. There are examples that might serve as models for readers by later generations (See Roger Chartier, dir., La Correspondance: les usages de la lettre au XIX e siècle, Paris, Fayard, 1991). For readers who are interested in the seventeeth century, the Arnaud family needs no Introduction except that there are so many who are truly famous that most readers need to know that Robert Arnaud d’Andilly was the son of the great advocate general of the Parlement who had numerous brothers and sisters. Robert’s early career as secretary to Sully became more illustrious because of his financial expertise. It goes without saying that he was very ambitious, but the succession of ministers, Luynes, Richelieu, and Mazarin all kept him at a distance, while all the while becoming man of letters. By the time he began writing his son Simon, he had a strong relationship with all the Jansenists, and had the recognition of being a major poet who would undertake the translation of Flavius Josephus into French. He was a widower at age 53 when he first wrote Simon, at his post in northern Italy (Casal), and he was tempted to become a solitaire at Port Royal des Champs where his illustrious sisters were leaders in monastic reform, and his daughters were on the way to becoming nuns in 1642 (See Daniella Kostroun, Feminism, Absolutism, and Jansenism: Louis XIV and the Port Royal Nuns, Cambridge University Press, 2011). Comptes rendus PFSCL LII, 102 DOI 10.24053/ PFSCL-2025-0016 234 D’Andilly’s son received a stream of advice from his father, but only after they acted out in writing a very religious and affectionate exchange of letters, a veritable surenchère or testing of the son’s ability to write in intimate religious prose. Centered on friendship, it remains unclear as to whether or not d’Andilly believed that only divine authority would help him keep Simon spiritually close. Cicero’s letters to his son Marcus are much more secular. D’Andilly’s model for these letters, if there is one, may be correspondence between the fathers of the early Church, those of Paulinus of Nola being an example. Simon had participated heavily in the Fouquet financial magic, so when the minister was arrested and his money confiscated by the crown, Simon suffered a heavy loss. There was no recourse but to try to mount a campaigne to influence Colbert and Fouquet’s wife Marie-Madeleine de Castille to pay back the invesment. Simon keeps his father informed and shares his worries but the father does not express much empathy for his son on money matters. Perhaps d’Andilly had settled an income on Simon, and he helped take care of his children as well as relatives who had spent time in the Bastille because of their Jansenist views (Le Maistre de Sacy). D’Andilly wrote back about work on the château of Pomponne, and planting trees. He finally became a solitaire at Port Royal, and would die there in 1674. After Cazal Simon was posted to Stockholm, where the cold and absence of ministers irritated him. He could have engaged on the issues brought up by Christine of Sweden’s abdication and conversion, but he did not. His major correspondence such as despatches and letters to the king were submitted for review by his father. In turn, translated chapters of Josephus would be sent to Stockholm to be read by Simon, who was well read, but in no position to challenge his father’s choice of words in a learned translation. Simon did intrervene to suggestions on the draft of the Memoires, very probably regarding the fugue between the father and another son. Once posted to the Hague Simon began to travel around and write typical travel observations about various cities. While these postings were very honorable though doubtlessly poorly compensated, they were also exiles for someone who had particapated in Fouquet’s monetary schemes. Simon continued carrying out diplomatic duties while remaining totally engaged in impeding the European states from allying with each other against France as a result of Louis XIV’s War of Devolution. His letters pleased the king, who offered him the high office of secretary of state. Did the king help Simon to buy such a really expensive office? Other sources than the letter would probably answer that question. The postings to Casal, Stockholm, and the Hague were welcome appointments, but they were also exiles for someone who had participated in Comptes rendus PFSCL LII, 102 DOI 10.24053/ PFSCL-2025-0016 235 Fouquet’s money making schemes (See Julian Swann, Exile, Imprisonment, or Death. The Politics of Disgrace in Bourbon France, 1610-1789, Oxford University Press, 2017). Scarcely adjusted to being secretary of state, Louis surprised Simon completely by making him a minister of state with a seat on the councils of state. Lionne had died, which helps to explain Simon’s rise, but it was also the satisfaction given by the content and style of his writing. There was just the right amount of lofty French not to be called flattery and incisive analysis. Earlier, there had been an oblique phrase about hope that the king would not go to war again after Devolution. There are brief references to numerous literary giants in the letters, but only those to Madame de Sevigné are of interest, and they are published elsewhere. Madame de Lafayette was a regular conrrespondent with d’Andilly, and so was the Duc de La Rochefoucauld, and the uncles, including the Great Arnauld, the theologian. Finally, though Racine is not mentioned in the index of names, he is in the book, p. 31. He and his son, Jean-Baptiste, gentilhomme de la chambre in a later ambassadorial household at the Hague, suggests interesting comparisons even though the son’s letters have never been found. Racine writes about daily family life, a daughter who is seeking to join Port Royal as a nun (it is forbidden), constantly worrying about his son’s conduict (See André Blanc, Racine. Trois siècles de théâtre, Paris, Fayard, 2003), and his declining health. Unlike Simon, Jean-Baptiste never climbed into high office. The great playwright sought to be buried at the feet of one of his teachers at Port Royal, and instead of translating an ancient historian he wrote a short history of Port Royal to support an aunt in her battles to preserve Port Royal from destruction. Voltaire wrote that it was written in the purist French prose that he had ever read. This reviewer lacks the expertise to evaluate French classical prose, but are not d’Andilly’s Memoires and letters of equal prose distinction? Orest Ranum