Patrice de La Tour du Pin is a major Catholic poet, and indeed a major poet by any reckoning. Much of his life was devoted to the elaboration of a single work in three volumes, Une Somme de poésie (A Summa of Poetry), which was published in its definitive form in three volumes in 1981-1983, but fragments of which had appeared over the preceding half-century, with the first major portion published as Une Somme de poésie (1946).

Patrice Arthur Elie Humbert de La Tour du Pin Chambly de La Charce was born in Paris on 16 March 1911, the eve of St Patrick's Day: hence the name Patrice. His mother, born Brigitte O'Connor, was the great-granddaughter of Arthur O'Connor, an Irish parliamentarian who defended Catholic rights, later joining Napoleon's army and rising to the rank of general. Arthur O'Connor married Elisa de Condorcet, the daughter of the...