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Jean Racine

1639 – 1699 · La Ferté-Milon

Jean Racine

A quiet man from a small town who taught French to burn.

Born La Ferté-Milon, France

About

Jean Racine was born in 1639 in La Ferté-Milon, a small town in northern France. He lost both parents as a young child, so he was raised by his grandmother. She sent him to be educated at Port-Royal, a strict religious community linked to the Jansenists. The Jansenists were a Catholic movement that stressed human weakness and the need for grace. At Port-Royal he read Greek and Latin deeply, which shaped everything he later wrote.

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