Tea at Trianon: Obscenity

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 9, 2015

Obscenity

I had originally decided to ignore the obscenity that now desecrates the work of the great Le Nôtre, the gardens of Versailles. Then I discovered that works by the same "artist" are all over the gardens, therefore I must express my outrage. To quote the Daily Mail:

Dirty Corner (Le Vagin de la Reine) is set to officially open to the public next week but shocked locals have criticised the structure. Many complained that the adult sculpture has been located so close to the opulent Palace of Versailles - a UNESCO's World Heritage site and one of the largest and most opulent castles in the world. With 15 million visitors a year, many of which are families with young children, bloggers have protested that it clashes with the attraction's family values and have called for as boycott. François de Mazières, Versailles's mayor and MP of Nicolas Sarkozy's rightwing Républicains party, tweeted that he thought Kapoor had 'slipped up' over statue. But others disagree and have hailed the artist as a 'genius provocateur'. Whether love it or loathe it, locals have been discussing the artwork which is sure to get big crowds when it does open on Tuesday. Kapoor's last giant sculpture, Monumenta unveiled at the Grand Palais in Paris in 2011,was seen by almost 300,000. (Read more.)

What would possess the French to sully their own heritage with such monstrosities? As for the latest pile of filth designed to once again soil the memory of the Queen-Martyr, it fills me with sorrow to know that in the place where she once walked with her own children there now sits an ugly piece of junk from the pit of hell. People have lost their minds. And the Revolution triumphs once again over that which is good and beautiful. Share

1 comment:

julygirl said...: There is general decline of graciousness and good taste in the Western Hemisphere, and the succeeding generation seems to be continuing the movement toward total glorification of the unglorious.; June 9, 2015 at 9:51:00 PM EDT