Tea at Trianon: Princess Margaret and Lord Snowdon

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, December 31, 2013

Princess Margaret and Lord Snowdon

The view from their apartment. From RL Magazine:

In 1960, the couple married and took up residence in Apartment 1A. Although Lord Snowdon quickly learned royal protocol, de Courcy says, his common lineage earned him the scorn of many in their circle, including the servants. Ruby, the princess’s dresser, was charged with bringing tea and juice to Princess Margaret each morning, yet she never brought anything for Lord Snowdon. Not content to be a kept man, Lord Snowdon soon took a job at the Sunday Times, earning acclaim for his documentaries on the poor and elderly, as well as his chronicles of society. Although the couple’s love and passion for each other were palpable, Princess Margaret was used to getting her way, and any feeling of suffocation made Lord Snowdon retreat deep into his work. A few years into the marriage, cracks began to form beneath their glittering façade. (Read more.)