Tea at Trianon: A ‘Vulgar Insult to France’

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, February 18, 2025

A ‘Vulgar Insult to France’

The PBS biopic, purportedly about Marie-Antoinette and Louis XVI, is yet another Anglo-Saxon mockery of French culture and history, portraying the court at Versailles as one long orgiastic escapade. Not that the French aren't capable of debasing themselves. But I cannot help recalling how British Parliament helped to print many of the original pornographic pamphlets about the Queen, in accord with their view of papists and foreigners, with the ultimate goal of weakening the French monarchy. As for a "feminist" view of Marie-Antoinette, such a concept was completely alien to her. There was no feminism and to show it is anachronistic. And how a "feminist" approach translates into orgies utterly befuddles me. Marie-Antoinette worked for the dignity of women, educating them and helping them find trades and make good marriages, or even become nuns, if they were so inclined. From The Times:

A scene depicting sex party attended by the statesman who tried to save France from bankruptcy in the 18th century has riled French critics over English-language efforts to rebrand Queen Marie Antoinette as a feisty feminist ahead of her time. The scene, which outraged Blaise de Chabalier, Le Figaro’s reviewer, involves Charles-Alexandre de Calonne, controller of finance under King Louis XVI. It appeared in the second series of Marie Antoinette, a wigs-and-waistcoats drama created by the British screenwriter Deborah Davis. Calonne, a stern economist who tried to reform the kingdom, is presented bare-chested and waving a wine glass among writhing bodies at an orgy in Versailles.
“This sequence is coarse, unconnected with historic reality and without the slightest interest for plot development,” Le Figaro said.
Released this week, the new series, starring Emilia Schüle as the doomed Marie Antoinette, is “another ridiculous and vulgar insult to the late queen of France”, the review added. Louis is played by Louis Cunningham in the series, produced by Canal+, a French pay-to-view television channel.
Other reviews of the drama, to be broadcast in the UK by BBC2, have been more indulgent, praising lively dialogue and its sumptuous cinematography, shot in the palace of Versailles. “If this English-language fiction teaches us nothing very new … it does offer an entertaining point of view on Marie Antoinette and her family,” Les Echos newspaper said.
The Télé-Loisirs entertainment guide said the series, which focuses on the “diamond necklace affair”, a scandal that engulfed the queen in 1784, “highlights the gossip and shenanigans of the court, and shows off sublime outfits”. Télérama, a culture magazine said “it draws you into the corridors of Versailles like the glossy pages of a celebrity magazine”.
The first series, a hit in Britain and other countries, performed relatively well in France, but it appalled conservatives and purists who dismissed it as yet another sullying of the history of the Bourbon dynasty for “Anglo-Saxon” entertainment. The model was set in 2006 with Sofia Coppola’s version of the queen as a rock’n’roll-style rebel.
“Bridgerton meets Love Island”, “Dallas meets Versailles” and “packed with anachronisms” were among the critiques of the first series, which depicted a sex-soaked version of the decade after the Austrian-born princess married 15-year-old Louis in 1770.
Évelyne Lever, an academic expert on Marie Antoinette and the Versailles court, called the series a “litany of aberrations”. It was acceptable to take liberties with biopics “but this is a grotesque caricature”, she said. She said that there was nothing avant-garde and militantly feminist about the real-life Marie Antoinette. “She had very conventional ideas, as she showed in the revolution,” she added. (Read more.)