Tea at Trianon: Villa of Death

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Sunday, February 5, 2012

Villa of Death

The third in a series of mysteries which feature author Daphne du Maurier as the heroine, The Villa of Death brings readers to a mansion on the Cornish coast, fraught with legends, secrets, romance, and murder. We see Daphne grow as a woman and a writer as she helps her friend Ellen, heiress of the Thornleigh estate, face unthinkable and unexpected tragedy on the very day which is supposed to seal her future happiness. Among the large cast of characters, many of whom seem to run together at times, the dashing Major Browning of Scotland Yard stands out as the man most likely to sweep Daphne off her feet, except for one uncomfortable obstacle: he already has a fiancée. Even as they try to decide what they are to each other, Daphne and the major are thrown together in their efforts to solve a growing number of murders and even a kidnapping.

Set in the late 1920s amid glittering tea parties and lavish receptions, conventional society is shaken by the challenges to its mores that characterize the era between the Wars. I found myself wanting to know more about Daphne’s family and less about the morbid situations of the book. It was entertaining, nevertheless, to solve crimes with her while seeing stories take shape in her mind. It is obvious that her life as a woman and her life as a writer are already at odds with each other, a theme that will hopefully be explored more in future novels by Challis.