The French novelist, journalist, and cleric Abbé Prévost (1697-1763) was an adventurer who lived by his intrigues and his pen. His best-known work is the novel "Manon Lescaut."

Antoine François Prévost d'Exiles, who is known as the Abbé Prévost, was first exposed to conventual discipline when he entered a Jesuit school at the age of 14, following his father's death. In the years that ensued, he alternated military service, love affairs, and intense literary activity with periods as first a Jesuit and then a Benedictine novice. He was ordained a Benedictine priest in 1721 and for eight years engaged in study, teaching, and scholarly work in a variety of Benedictine communities.

Restless and unhappy, he settled for a time at St-Germain-des-Prés in Paris, where he began to write in secret the fictional compendium Les Mémoires et...