Jacques-Henri Bernardin de Saint-Pierre

Jacques-Henri Bernardin de Saint-Pierre (1737-1814), French writer, whose work foreshadowed the Romantic movement. Born in Le Havre, he held a government post in Île de France (now Mauritius) from 1768 to 1771. On his return to France he became a follower of the philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Saint-Pierre's works embody imagination, sentiment, and love of nature, as opposed to the emphasis on wit and external form that characterized most of the French literature of his time. He wrote Voyage á L'Île de France (1773; trans. 1775) and Paul et Virginie (1788; trans. 1789), which is generally regarded as his masterpiece.