Every year I make a resolution to read more non-fiction. It's a sad state of affairs when a librarian has to make a reading resolution, but it has to happen. I did better this year than ever before. Especially biographies. Nearly all of the biographies I read are about women, because really, don't we all have enough old, white guys in our lives (especially during an election year?) Do I have to read about them, too?
Here are the greatest [lady] hits of 2012.
I like Cleopatra. I think she's neat. After Cleopatra: A Life was published, Stacy Schiff visited Pittsburgh as part of the Arts and Lectures Literary Evenings (season tickets for $100!) program. The typical person knows three things about Cleopatra. 1.) She looked like this. 2.) She was delivered to Julius Caesar rolled up in a carpet. 3.) She was a sex-crazed she-wolf who brought down the mighty, noble Mark Antony (who was chilling in Egypt with Cleopatra while his wife in Rome was trying to save his reputation. But, whatever. As with most woman rulers the dudes got to write the history.) What perhaps isn't known about her is that she was a shrewd politician, strategist and negotiator with excellent administrative skills. She spoke Egyptian (the only of her family to do so,) Greek, Ethiopian, and the languages of the Medes, Jews, Partians, Arabs, Syrians and Trogodytae. Under her rule, Egyptian art and culture flourished and the Royal Library at Alexandria was considered the center of scholarship until the Romans showed up and burned it down like a bunch of goddamn heathens. There's a reason Rome wanted Alexandria and it wasn't for the views. And she did all of this while raising 4 children. Boom.
For quality historical fiction and non-fiction about the Kings and Queens of Great Britain, you cannot go wrong with Alison Weir. She not only wrote the biography of Eleanor of Aquitaine, but also wrote a fictionalized account of her life. Eleanor was a was a wealthy land-owning Duchess in her own right, educated by the finest minds of her time, a poet and a scholar when she married Louis. Oh, did I mention she was the Queen of France and England? Not only that, but for 20 years she helped King Henry (II) run his empire and gave him eight (OMFG) children. Alas, she got caught up in a plot with her sons to overthrow her (cheating ass) husband and was imprisoned for 20 years. But the old bird outlasted Henry II, was released by her son Richard and was closely involved in the governments of both England and Aquitaine until her death. She was portrayed by Katharine Hepburn in the excellent 1968 movie The Lion in Winter.
Queen Consort of Edward IV and mother to the young, dead Princes in the Tower. There is a myth about Elizabeth Woodville that her family was descended from Melusine and that she "captured" Edward IV through witchcraft. Because accepting that the King of England fell for a charming, smart piece of ass was way too hard for some folks (like Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick and "Kingmaker") to accept. Elizabeth drove Edward's advisers crazy by doling out land and titles to her own family, but honestly, that's what every Queen did. Basically, the majority opinion was that she wasn't good enough (what with her low birth and widowhood) to be Queen Consort. Awesomely, she is remembered as the grandmother of Henry VIII and the great-grandmother of arguably the best monarch in English history, Elizabeth I. Suck it, Earl of Warwick.
She did not fuck a horse. I repeat, Catherine the friggin' Great, Empress of all the Russians, Her Imperial Highness did. not. fuck. a. horse. You know what she did do? I mean, besides make Russia one of the biggest countries in the world, a military superpower and a leader in culture? She also ushered in the Russian Age of Enlightenment. Oh, she had lots and lots of lovers for sure, but none of the equine variety. It was easier for (male) historians to condemn her for her sex life than acknowledge her amazing accomplishments. She was a serious despot though. Like made it easier for landowners to kill their serfs kind of despot. Yikes.
(That whole French Revolution thing I talked about in my last post.) I first came across the story of Madame Tussaud in the historical fiction book Madame Tussaud: A Novel of the French Revolution by Michelle Moran. Moran, incidentally, has also written excellent fiction about Nefertiti, Cleopatra's family and Empress Marie-Louise. Madame Tussaud's story is an epic rags-to-riches tale about an excellent businesswoman and survivor of the French Revolution. Cashing in on the celebrity obsessed public with her wax figures, at the height of the Revolution, Tussaud was forced to make wax death masks of her own friends killed as traitors. She was also friends with Marie Antoinette and Marat. That she was able to maintain these two oil and water friendships is a true testament to her flexibility, flair and hunger for publicity.
(French revolution thing again) Two things about Marie Antoinette. First, she got married to the future King of France when she was 14. Let me say that again. She got married when she was 14. Not only that, but she had to leave her home, travel hundreds of miles in a shitty form of transportation, only to be handed off to a bunch of hostile French strangers. She couldn't even keep her dog. Her dog, man. I don't know about you, but I was a total mess when I was 14. And I didn't get married until I was 30. Second of all, she did not, ever, at any time, say the words, "Let them eat cake." That did not happen.
[Let them eat cake] was said 100 years before by Marie-Therese, the wife of Louis XIV. It was a callous and ignorant statement and she, Marie Antoinette, was neither. -Antonia Fraser
This isn't just one of my favorite biographies of 2012, it's one of my favorite books. Born Rose de Tasher on a sugar plantation on the island of Martinique, Josephine was wild, sensual, fashionable and willful- also a cougar (by the day's standards.) Rawr. Catching the eye of Napoleon, she became not only his lover, but his hostess, his confidante and Empress. Josephine barely escaped the guillotine during the Revolution, but survived to flourish in post-revolutionary France. And although Napoleon put her aside for dynastic reasons, she always had his heart. In the very cool book Love Letters of Great Men and Women: From the Eighteenth Century to the Present Day by C.H. Charles, there is quote from a letter to Josephine:
If I am ready to execrate this life, I put my hand upon my heart, they portrait beats there; I look at it, and love is for me absolute happiness, and everything is smiling excepting the time when I see myself absent from my friend.Other fantastic women I read about this year include Wallis Simpson, Queen Elizabeth II, Queen Victoria and a whole slew of French and English mistresses. Because let's face it, if I had lived then I sure as hell wouldn't be an Empress or a Queen. And let's take nun, wet nurse and nanny off the table, too.
Happy New Year!
Absolutely nothing wrong with old, white guys!
ReplyDeleteThanks so much for the recommendations. I have read a few of these this past year as well and I am looking forward to getting my hands on a couple of them that I hadn't come across yet but love the sound of.
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