Tea at Trianon: Maria Theresa of Austria-Este

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

Tuesday, June 5, 2012

Maria Theresa of Austria-Este

The Comtesse de Chambord, wife of the French pretender, Henri V. Some say she was chosen by Henri's aunt Marie-Thérèse-Charlotte of France, daughter of Louis XVI and Marie-Antoinette, for her plainness as well as her religious devotion. The Comte and Comtesse were childless. For more about the daughter of Marie-Antoinette and her family read the novel Madame Royale.

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3 comments:

May said...: I was just reading a rather amusing negative Amazon review of MADAME ROYALE:

"It has one good feature, it is consistently bad. It is loaded with cliches, so much so it seems to be written for dumb blondes who normally don't read."

Please. Just picking Marie-Thérèse as a heroine is not a cliché. How many other novels are even written about her? She is quite a difficult, thorny character, not at all the standard heroine of a mushy romance for "dumb blondes". Really.; June 5, 2012 at 5:53:00 PM EDT
elena maria vidal said...: Most of the bad reviews I get on Amazon are from people who clearly did not read the books, which means they are written out of sheer spite.; June 5, 2012 at 6:19:00 PM EDT
julygirl said...: First of all, to the misguided person who made that statement, I resent the dumb blonde comment....talk about cliches! Secondly a 'dumb' person would not even select that novel to read, and if by chance she did, the political issues that are referenced would be way over her head. As far as I can tell, the book is scrupulously researched and is beautifully written by a skilled and gifted writer. It brought that period of French history, unfamiliar to the average American, to life in a captivating way. It was written out of love for the subject matter, and the vicious person who keeps placing the negative reviews, (and I do believe it is a particular faction), are showing their vile ignorance.; June 5, 2012 at 6:52:00 PM EDT