French
scientific writer and translator into French of
Isaac Newton's Principia.
Her marriage to the Marquis du Châtelet 1725 gave her the leisure
to study physics and mathematics. She met controversial French writer
Voltaire 1733, and settled with him at her husband's estate at Cirey,
in the Duchy of Lorraine. Her study of Newton, with whom she collaborated
on various scientific works, influenced Voltaire's work. She independently
produced the first (and only) French translation of Newton's Principia
(published posthumously in 1759). |