Calprenede, Walter De Costes

, a French dramatic and romance writer, was born in the chateau of Toulgon in Perigord, in the diocese of Cahors, about the year 1612, and became gentleman in ordinary to the king. He is said to have conciliated the good opinion of the court by his happy talent for telling agreeable stories. When a very young man he wrote several tragedies and comedies which procured him some reputation, particularly his “Mithridates” and the “Earl of Essex,” but he was most celebrated for his romances, particularly “Cassandra,” “Cleopatra,” and “Pharamond,” which gave place, however, to a better taste in the course of some years, and are now thought intolerable by their insipidity and tediousness. Calprenede had an excellent opinion of himself, and when the cardinal Richelieu said of some of his verses, that they were dull, he replied that “nothing dull belonged to the family of Calprenede.” He died in 1663. ²