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157 - Anne-Robert-Jacques TURGOT (1727–1781).
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Estimate €800 - €1,000
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Description
Anne-Robert-Jacques TURGOT (1727–1781). L.A., Limoges, 24 September 1771, to his former secretary Antoine-Bernard Caillard in Parma; 2 pages, quarto, address with red wax seal (broken). Concerning his *Dido*, a verse translation of Virgil, and Voltaire. Turgot gives him an update on his health, his travels, and the progress of his *Dido*, which is making little headway: ‘I wrote to you several months ago that I had 141 lines left to translate; the very next day I wrote five to finish bringing together the two major sections on the hunt and the speeches of Dido and Aeneas. Since then, not a single verse has come to me.” Referring to Vadé’s *Le déjeuner de la Rapée* and an anecdote concerning an organist at Saint-Sulpice, he explains that it is not a lack of desire to make progress that is holding him back. He is quite pleased with his translation of the Tenth Eclogue, which he sends to Caillard: if the latter were to pass through Ferney on his return, perhaps he might mention it as a gift from the Abbé de Laage [the pseudonym under which Turgot sent his verses to Voltaire]. ‘This piece ought to be written in prose, but by reading it yourself, you might gauge the effect of this prose, which might perhaps be more pleasing to the ear than to the eye. But […] perhaps this prose will be greatly disliked once its structure has been deduced’…
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About the sale Letters and Autograph Manuscripts – Part I
Auction location
Auction time 10/13/2026 at 2:00 PM
Pictures credits: Contact the Auction House
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