Tea at Trianon: Jane Austen Vibes

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

Thursday, February 1, 2024

Jane Austen Vibes

An actress with exquisite taste. From Architectural Digest:

A home base on the East Coast was always in the script for actor-director Bryce Dallas Howard and her husband, actor Seth Gabel. “We love LA, but we associate it with work,” Howard says of their primary residence—a West Coast new-build, filled with entertainment industry memorabilia. While some might consider the eldest daughter of Academy Award–winning director Ron Howard Hollywood royalty, Howard calls the New York metropolitan area home.
“I grew up in Westchester County and Greenwich, Connecticut. My family is still there. I went to NYU, where my husband and I met and fell in love,” says the actor, whose latest role is in Argylle, out this week. In 2017, the couple purchased a 1930s stone home in a historic New York state hamlet, picturing holidays with nearby family and a routine out of the spotlight for their children.
Their meet-cute with the house sounds like the opening of a rom-com: The couple was open-house hopping when Gabel spotted the one. “He kept saying, ‘I want a house like that,’” Howard remembers. Days later, a real estate agent who’d noticed them in the neighborhood contacted them about the property before it hit the market.
“Later, we found out things that made us realize it was meant to be,” says Howard. First, there was the current owners’ running joke about Howard. “They were watching Chelsea Handler one night, and I was a guest. The wife, a designer, turned to her husband and commented on how perfect my coloring is for the house. And her husband was like, ‘Are you kidding me?’” the redhead laughs. (Read more.)