Tea at Trianon: What Richard III Sounded Like

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, October 22, 2024

What Richard III Sounded Like

From Murrey and Blue:

A couple of weeks ago I posted about a new theory concerning Richard III’s voice, see here https://murreyandblue.org/2024/09/28/another-theory-about-richard-iiis-voice/). Well, we may still have to wait until 17 November at the York Theatre Royal (https://www.yorktheatreroyal.co.uk/show/a-voice-for-king-richard-iii/) to hear and see the avatar of Richard III as he is now believed to have sounded, but there is a little taster from Down Under, as you can hear at this link: https://www.abc.net.au/listen/programs/saturdayextra/recreating-the-voice-of-richard-iii/104436374

It’s from a Saturday Extra interview by Fran Kelly on ABC Radio National, Australia. She’s speaking to Yvonne Morley-Chisholm (https://yourvoicebox.co.uk/) vocal coach and founder of A Voice for Richard (the event to be heard at York Theatre Royal in November).

We’re told that in order to produce (apparently with 95% accuracy) what Richard would have sounded like, and to make it even more accurate they used a letter that Richard wrote in 1483 concerning the investiture of his son as Prince of Wales Then they had to find a man who looked like the Facial Reconstruction for Richard III, because every little detail comes together to make a whole, and they found him in one Thomas Dennis, who had played Richard at events at Warwick Castle. See my earlier link above. He will be heard in York Theatre Royal on 17 November 2024, when an avatar of Richard’s Facial Reconstruction will move in harmony with his voice, for an even more realistic effect. (Read more.)