 He became friends with Valentin Conrart, Gilles Ménage, Jean Chapelain, François-Eudes de Mézeray and Pierre Corneille; he wrote poetry on demand; and he gained a reputation for his playful, elegant and ironic poems (such as his "Gageure" or "Epigrammes contre une femme fardée", 150 epigrams and madrigals against a woman wearing make-up) and his skill with "vers libre" (free verse).He also wrote works in a burlesque vein, much like Paul Scarron, in his baroque parodies of Virgil's "Aeneid" and Lucan's "Pharsalia".His reputation is most linked to his non-burlesque free translation of Lucan's "Pharsalia".