Voltaire. Voltaire's image as an autonomous writer, nearly unique in the eighteenth century, is evident in a 1765 portrait drawing of him at work at his desk, at his estate of Ferney. It was reproduced in numerous engravings at the end and after his life as in this engraving by G. W. Weise, from 1779, which appears from the BN-Éstampes (Collection Henin, 9655).