Catherine Bernard was one of the most celebrated poets of her day, winning both the prize of the Académié Française and Toulouse's Jeux Floraux prize for poetry, each three times, the most allowed. In addition to excelling in the poetic genres admired in the seventeenth century, in particular those celebrating King Louis XIV, Bernard won praise for her tragedies--a genre rarely chosen by her female contemporaries--as well as for her novels. Bernard was thus an active and recognized member of the literary establishment of the late seventeenth century. Her works reflect and respond to the tastes of her public, tastes that have often not carried over into later centuries. Changing literary tastes explain most adequately why Bernard's name and works are known by only a few literary historians specializing in the period.

Bernard's birth and literary and genealogical associations have been the subject...