Portrait

Tags

France, NGC, Ottawa, salon de la paix, Versailles, Vigée-Lebrun

Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI had four children. They could not have been born at a more problematic time for the French royal family.

Marie-Thérèse Charlotte, known as Madame Royale was the only child, named after her grand-mother Empress Marie-Therese of Austria to survive the French revolution and reach adulthood. Eleven years old when the revolution erupted, in 1789, she was particularly close to her father the King.

Louis-Joseph, the first born son of the royal couple was spared the pains of revolution. He died of tuberculosis, at age seven, on the 4th of June, 1789. By all accounts a sweet child, the prince’s death added immeasurable grief to the lives of his parents the month before the revolution began.

After the death of his older brother, Louis-Charles, born in 1785 and sometimes referred to as Louis XVII, became dauphin. Subjected to the most cruel treatment by revolutionaries, the young prince was ten years old at his death in 1795.

Sophie-Beatrix was the family’s youngest child. Born in July of 1786, she died the following year – age eleven months – also of tuberculosis.

 

Because of the scandal of l’affaire du Collier, the ministers of the King ordered Vigée-Lebrun to do this propaganda painting, a tableau about family devotion and parental love. Though the Queen was cleared of any responsibility in the affair of the diamond necklace, the vicious press and a largely ignorant public hounded Marie-Antoinette. We know now that King Louis XVI brother, Prince Louis Stanislas Xavier, Comte de Provence  was also plotting against his brother, he was encouraging rumours and did little to help his unfortunate relatives. He was able to leave France with a false British Passport for a 23 year long exile around Europe, living on the charity of various Sovereigns. Returning to France in 1814 to become Louis XVIII.

This family portrait was painted at Versailles in what is today the Salon de la Paix at the end of the Galerie des Glaces, it was then a private salon used by the Queen. If you look closely at the painting you glimpse at the Gallerie des Glaces in the left corner. See picture below as it is today.

Le Salon de la Paix, the Queen is seated to the right of the door, she is surrounded by her children. Her eldest son is pointing to the empty crib of his sister Sophie-Beatrix who died a few months before this painting was done. He is already sick with tuberculosis and will be dead in just a few months after this painting is completed. Truly a painting of tragedy. The cabinet in the background to the left of the tableau represents a strong box keeping locked up the jewels of the Queen. This is a reference to the alleged extravagance of the Queen. Marie-Antoinette herself only wears a pair of pearl hearings. This piece of furniture is almost in shadow and tucked away, not very important to the tableau, another message in this composition.

The composition of this painting also refers to a famous story in Greek antiquity of another mother and her children, who is asked what is most precious to her. Despite being wealthy, she presents her children as a reply, this is my wealth. This is the obvious symbolism of this painting. There is no doubt that the Queen was devoted to her children this was her wealth and this message had an impact on the French public at large. However by the time this painting was shown, it was too late. In 1793 at the 2 day trial of the Queen, she did not stand accuse or charge with any crime, the tribunal was divided on what to do. The revolutionaries were well aware that it would be difficult to pass a death sentence on Marie-Antoinette 37 yrs old. So without proof it was decided that she was guilty of treason, a farce by any judicial standard.

She was a mother and the public was against executing the mother with small children. On the day of her execution as she was brought to her public execution the streets were very silent and the mood of the crowd was sullen. The troops on hand were nervous and feared violence against the tribunal and the revolutionary government.

1787, Château de Versailles, la Reine Marie-Antoinette et ses enfants.

By Court painter to the Queen of France, Louise-Elizabeth Vigée-Lebrun

Louise Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun (also known as Madame LeBrun) was the most-famous female painter of the 18th century.  So impressed was Marie Antoinette with Vigée Le Brun’s work that she had the artist create more than thirty portraits of the Queen and her family. This large painting, remained at the Palace of Versailles after the fall of the Monarchy and only left the Palace 4 years ago for the first time ever to travel to the National Gallery of Canada in Ottawa for a retrospective exhibit of Lebrun’s paintings.

 

 

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Petite Fleur

Tags

creole, France, Music, New Orleans, Radio Canada, Sidney Bechet

A great jazz piece by Sidney Bechet with Claude Luter And His Orchestra: Sidney Bechet (ss), Guy Longnon, Claude Rabanite (tp), Bernard Zacharias (tb), Claude Luter (cl), Christian Azzi or Raymond Fol (p), Roland Bianchini (b), Moustache (d) Paris, January 31 — March 12, 1952

 

Heard it last night on the radio show ”Quand le Jazz est là” with Stanley Péan on Radio-Canada from Montreal. Such lovely music, I find it very evocative.

Stanley Péan knows his audience and always plays the best of Jazz in its many forms. He knows the listeners are knowledgeable and adults and should not be treated like kids.

Bechet was born in New Orleans in 1897 to a middle-class Creole family. His older brother, Leonard Victor Bechet, was a full-time dentist and a part-time trombonist and bandleader. Bechet learned several musical instruments that were kept around the house, mostly by teaching himself; he decided to specialize in the clarinet.

In the 1940s, Bechet played in several bands, but his financial situation did not improve until the end of that decade. By the end of the 1940s, Bechet had tired of struggling to make music in the United States. His contract with Jazz Limited, a Chicago-based record label, was limiting the events at which he could perform. He believed that the jazz scene in the United States had little left to offer him and was getting stale. In 1950 he moved to France, after his performance as a soloist at the Paris Jazz Fair caused a surge in his popularity in that country, where he easily found well-paid work. In 1951, he married Elisabeth Ziegler in Antibes.

In 1953, he signed a recording contract with Disques Vogue that lasted for the rest of his life. He recorded many hit tunes, including “Les Oignons”, “Promenade aux Champs-Elysees”, and the international hit “Petite Fleur“. He also composed a classical ballet score in the late Romantic style of Tchaikovsky called La Nuit est sorcière (“The Night Is a Witch”). Some existentialists in France took to calling him le dieu (“the god”).

Souvenir from long ago

Tags

Augusta Holmes, Canada., France, long ago, Mathé Altery, Noël, operetta, Quebec

This morning we were listening to Radio-Canada programming from Montréal and the weekly show was playing music from the 1950’s and 1960’s. French singers who are well known and were the big names of their time with many hits. On the weekend Radio-Canada has a programming of Oldies but goodies, tunes anyone over the age of 45 will recognize. This programming of French musical hits is highly popular. This is the sort of music my Mom would listen too and often sing along, she had a nice singing voice.

One of the French singers was Mathé Altery,  a French soprano singer prominent in the 1950s and 1960s for singing operettas and French songs. She was my Mom’s favourite French singer and we had all her records at home. Altery came to Montréal and gave several concerts. My parents met her, she was staying at the hotel my father managed at the time.

Here she sings an old favourite, Noël, trois anges sont venus. This piece was composed in 1884 by French composer Augusta Holmès. It is so very nice to hear this music for its quality in composition and lyrics.

This brings back a lot of memories from my childhood and Christmas then. Altery who is 91 years old now, lives in France. Her singing voice and her French diction was impeccable. She was the French voice of Julie Andrews in the movie the Sound of Music which came out 53 years ago. She sang the well known musical score in French, it is just as charming as the English version.

 

The words to this Christmas song,

Trois anges sont venus ce soir

M’apporter de bien belles choses,

L’un d’eux avait un encensoir,

L’autre avait un chapeau de roses,

Et le troisième avait en main

Une robe toute fleurie

De perles d’or et de jasmin

Comme en a Madame Marie.

Noël ! Noël !

Nous venons du ciel

T’apporter ce que tu désires,

Car le bon Dieu

Au fond du ciel bleu,

Est chagrin lorsque tu soupires.

Veux-tu le bel encensoir d’or

Ou la rose éclose en couronne ?

Veux-tu la robe, ou bien encore

Un collier où l’argent fleuronne ?

Veux-tu des fruits du Paradis

Ou du blé des célestes granges ?

Ou comme les bergers, jadis,

Veux-tu voir  Jésus dans ses langes ?

Noël ! Noël !

Retournez au ciel

Mes beaux anges, à l’instant même ;

Dans le ciel bleu,

Demandez à Dieu,

Le bonheur pour celui que j’aime.

Augusta Holmès

 

Books I am reading

Tags

books, D'Ormesson, France, Paris

Yes it is that time again to talk about books I am reading. I have always enjoyed reading since a very young age. My Mom started me on it and apparently I take after my paternal grandfather whose name I have, he too was a reader but mostly crime novels, he was a Police detective.

I am waiting for the arrival by mail of the latest book I ordered,  it is entitled, Rome: A history in seven sackings by Matthew Kneale.

I am still reading Josephus: The essential works by Josephus Flavius, which is the most precise description of Rome under the Flavian Dynasty as observed by the Jewish Courtier and ex-rebel Josephus. It is also considered a companion book to the Bible and the four gospels since Josephus lived in the era of the destruction of the Temple by Titus and the revolt against Roman rule in Palestine. Reading Josephus who writes about the Tribes of Israël and their conquest of the area known today as Israël and Palestine, I was reminded of another book by the great Portuguese Nobel Prize winner José Saramago, The gospel according to Jesus Christ, a very funny book where God is portrayed as a wealthy Jewish Merchant with a sadistic streak. The God of the Old Testament was one who ordered anyone not worshipping him to be killed. Josephus is clear in his description that Yahveh, God tells the Jews it is quite ok and good to kill all their enemies because they do not belong to the chosen people. And Yahveh is always willing to forgive the people of Israël if they forget him momentarily because he has only one chosen people. Strange on again off again relationship. Josephus also describes what it is like to live at the Court of the Emperor of Rome on the Palatine Hill and observe the goings on.

The other book I am struggling to finish reading is by the late Dean of the French Academy Jean D’Ormesson, the book in French is entitled Je dirai malgré tout que cette vie fut belle. D’Ormesson died last December in Paris at the age of 92 and was given a National funeral, with full honours at Les Invalides in the presence of the French President and past presidents.

For many years I saw him on French television, he spoke very well, cultivated the art of conversation and knew almost every well known person in France or Europe.  The book is about his family and his life and all the great people he knew. Written in the style of a trial in a French Court were the Judge asks questions of the accused in this case D’Ormesson details how he lived. I find it tedious to read, the style is mondain and full of reference to his very famous friends, dinner parties, vacations in Italy or Greece and always accompanied by famous friends. He sailed through life without any great difficulty, it is a life on another level far removed from the mundane or the ordinary.

Jean Bruno Wladimir François de Paule Le Fèvre d’Ormesson was a French novelist born in 1925. He was the author of forty books, the director of Le Figaro from 1974 to 1979, and the Dean of the Académie française. He received the Grande Croix de la Légion d’Honneur and his family owned 2 Chateaux, though through financial difficulties managed to loose them but nonetheless always maintained a good address in fashionable Paris.

D’Ormesson was from an old French noble family, Grandfather and father both Ambassadors, went to the great schools, a life of privilege, D’Ormesson became Secretary-General of the International Council for Philosophy and Humanistic Studies at UNESCO. He was a conservative Catholic philosopher, a recipient of the Ordre National du Mérite for his achievements in civilian life.

What I always liked about him was his elegance and how he could speak so well with a wonderful vocabulary, he was a pleasure to hear, even when you disagreed with him, you still liked him. Even in this book there is a great generosity of spirit, the sign of a great mind. No doubt that he had some influence in France in the political and social sphere. With his death an era has closed.

 

An air for Spring

Tags

1752, France, J.J.Rouseeau, operette, Spring

Today is such a wonderful day, full of sunshine and flowers everywhere, despite the cold breeze. Nothing better than to listen to this operette by Jean-Jacques Rousseau of 1752 to put you in the mood, so let’s all go into the garden  dansez sous les ormeaux!

 

Allons danser sous les ormeaux,
Animez–vous jeunes fillettes :
Allons danser sous les ormeaux,
Galans prenez vos chalumeaux.
Les Villageoises répetent ces quatre vers.

Colette.

Répétons mille chansonnettes,
Et pour avoir le cœur joyeux,
Dansons avec nos amoureux,
Mais n’y restons jamais seulettes.
Allons danser sous les ormeaux, &c.

Les Villageoises.

Allons danser sous les ormeaux, &c.

Colette.

À la Ville on fait bien plus de fracas ;
Mais sont–ils aussi gais dans leurs ébats ?
Toujours contens,
Toujours chantans ;
Beauté sans fard,
Plaisir sans art ;
Tous leurs Concerts valent–ils nos musettes ?
Allons danser sous les ormeaux, &c.

Looking at my readers

Tags

2017, 2018, Australia, blog, Canada., followers, France, Germany, Holy See, Italy, life, mexico, Netherlands, PEI, readers, Spain, Turkey, UK, USA, Vatican

I am looking at the stats for my blog and who is coming to read and maybe comment on my blog. Interesting stats, about 18,000 readers a year from around the planet, in some cases I wonder how they got attracted to my blog and why they would come back and comment or read again and again. I also noticed that those countries who do not appear at all on my list of readers are countries where either they have highly controlled internet (police state) like Belarus, Iran or are countries where the internet does not exist because of poor infrastructure and lack of reliable electric supply, like the Congo or Afghanistan. What intrigues me is readers from the Holy See (Vatican) which has a population of 921 people and is the smallest European Country totally surrounded by the City of Rome, must be some Cardinal no doubt. Then there readers from tiny places in the world like the Seychelles Islands, a group of 115 islands forming one republic in the North West corner of the Indian Ocean.

The largest group of readers are from the USA, Canada, UK, Australia, Spain, Italy, Mexico, the Netherlands, Germany, France, India, Turkey, Brazil. I also have 225 followers of my blog.

I always find it interesting to see how many diverse followers I have to my blog. People like to read what goes on elsewhere in the world and try to imagine maybe how life is in parts of the world they have not visited.  I am happy for their readership and who knows maybe they will want to visit or read more about Canada’s smallest Province Prince Edward Island and its small population of 150,000 persons.

For the readers, you all know that I write mostly about my home and life in general, maybe some observation about something that strikes me as odd or of our time.

Now to the last few days of 2017 and onwards then to 2018 with all of its many surprises.

 

great conductors

Tags

Conductors, France, Francis Poulenc, George Pretre, Maria Callas, Vienna, Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra

Last night at home we were talking about George Prêtre, the great French conductor and how he was a favourite with the Vienna Philarmonic Orchestra. This morning I discovered he had died last night at the age of 92 at his chateau de Vaudricourt à Naves near Castres in France. The XXth Century gave us some very great conductors, to me they are people who do not beat time but feel the music and try to get the orchestra to share in that feeling and show the melodic nuance in a composition. This is not easily achieved and few can do it, he certainly could.

He will conduct the premier of Francis Poulenc, La Voix Humaine in 1959. He will also work with Maria Callas for many years. He will conduct during his long career all the great orchestras of the world. He became a favourite conductor in Vienna. He had style and pleased the public, a man of great intelligence and an athlete who practiced judo and karate. He once said, with a sly smile, that as Conductor he never had to use it on any of his musicians.

Maestro George Prêtre 1924-2017

fashion likes and dislikes

Tags

burka, Canada., chador, dress, France, hijab, laws, niqab, society, women

I am old enough to remember the 1960’s  and the debate then about the Bikini, mind you I was a kid then but nonetheless I paid attention to what was going on around me.

Then society in general did not approve of such an apparel, this also included pants for women, morality came up a lot in the conversation then, this type of clothing was risqué. Up until the 1960 women who according to societal norms had to wear skirts or dresses. In the mid 1950’s some fashion designers brought out pants for women to wear. This was quite revolutionary and not really the norm of what was acceptable then in society. But in large metropolitan centres like NYC and in Los Angeles it was seen among the rich and the famous who could flout society’s conventions.

Some movies also started to show women wearing pants, though such women were always portrayed as independent, upper middle-class and sporty, going to the beach or at some party around the swimming pool of their expensive homes, the Country Club set. In Canada you would really have to wait until the mid 1960’s to see such changes and even then it was frown upon. For those of you who remember The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson from 1962-1992, he started to mention almost as a provocation to his audience that if the Bikini was now Ok for prudish American society, well look at Saint-Tropez the women are topless. This was in the 1970’s and it was the subject of much comment and hilarity on his show.

So we now jump forward to today, since 1979 when the Shah of Iran left ”on vacation” due to the Iranian revolution under the Ayatollahs who imposed on Iranian women a strict dressing code which shocked Western countries and with the strong migration from Middle-Eastern countries since 2000 and the war in Afghanistan, the public through much media hoopla has become very aware of how women wear for various reasons in many countries with so called Islamic values various veils. The other question is if this is a religious requirement, on that topic a lot of misinformation exist and the worst convoluted stories circulate, much is hearsay and not based on fact.

I lived for 8 years on various countries in the Middle-East, Egypt, Sudan, Jordan, Syria, Iraq, Lebanon and Palestine. I also visited Iran in 2002. When people in Canada would speak to me about the Middle-East the one remark that always came up was how, 1. women could not drive a car and 2. how they had to cover up. In most cases people were thinking of Saudi Arabia and assumed that all other countries where Islam was the majority religion must be the same. I quickly learned that it was pointless to say that this was not the case, that each country was very different and societies were complex with their own history and evolution. What I learned was that people had their prejudice and would not be dissuaded.

If it is true that I saw some Hijabs in Egypt and less so in Syria or Jordan, I did not see them often in other countries like Lebanon. In Iran, women wore usually a kind of lomg scarf over their hair. I also saw and this was more a function of social standing, women from poor neighbourhood wearing more conservative dress than the more affluent women, usually these women would wear a chador.

Unfortunately in Canada the message is broad and general and makes no distinctions. It does not try to understand how societies far from us function in a context far removed from our own experience. Canadians do not always understand that various cultures in other continents function much differently than ours and do not care for what we think. We do make a lot of assumptions, clothes send signals in any society, clothes can be the basis for prejudice, racism, intolerance and discrimination.

Some in our society would like to dictate to others how to dress and behave for the sake of imposing a point of view as the correct one. You will hear comments on so call Muslim dress but in general in Canada we have not taken the French position on this matter which is now bordering on the ludicrous. A message of inclusiveness is more the Canadian norm.

With all the talk this Summer about France and Europe not adapting well to their changing societies. In France with politicians wrapping themselves in the French Flag and going on about Laicité and secular principles, what I take from that is how France has never got over its lost of prestige and influence in the World since September 1939. How it did not make the necessary effort to integrate its various ethnic population from former French Colonies. How the war in Algeria and the independence of that country was never accepted by the French. How they still try to pull political-economic strings in the Levant and in Africa. France does have the largest Muslim population in Europe but would like you to believe otherwise in the image it present of itself. So the latest spat on beach wear in various towns in France is the cherry on the cake. The social problems in France and many European countries are not new and stem from historical circumstances which we in Canada are free.

In Canada women in the RCMP can wear a hijab with their regulation uniform. There has not been much notice in the newspapers. Already and for 30 years now Sikh men can wear their turban as long as it is regulation colour with their police uniform.  In many ways Canada has taken a more mature approach to this topic. The general idea is that women can wear what they want, the question is why should it bother anyone. Society is not being threatened in any way by people’s dress, it was not in the 1960’s with the mini skirt or the bikini or women’s pants and it is not now.

We did have the spat during the Harper Regime with the issue of face covering or Niqab in Courts of Law and during Citizenship Ceremony where people have to take an Oath in order to become Citizens or when giving testimony in Court. The rule is and this was not sufficiently explained that any women who wanted to take her Oath of Citizenship could do so in private, if wearing of the Niqab was an issue for them, the Judge can see her face and administer the Oath. In this instance the Harper Regime made quite a lot of hullabaloo about the whole affair to please its extreme right wing base, that is behind us now.

All this to say that if we think of ourselves as a mature open society, intent on not repeating the errors of the past, we have to get over these dress behaviour hysterics and stop dictating what can and cannot be acceptable in women’s dress on the street. Just because it bothers or offends one person or a group based on so called modern personal views or belief.

The other day at Brackley Beach I did notice a women wearing a Burkini swimming. My concern was the severe undertow on the North side of the Island and I wondered if she was aware of the warning signs and the danger.  There were some people on the beach but it is quite a long beach many kilometres long and many parts are deserted with no lifeguard in sight. She was quite far from the shore and I hoped she would be ok. She did make it safely back to shore and then went to sit with her husband who was reading. I know that in France or elsewhere in Europe the reaction would have been quite different.

 

 

 

 

Bourreaux de l’Etat

Tags

Bourbon, Civil war, executioner, France, Louis XVI, profession, Revolution, Sanson

I follow a blog written in French by Marie-Christine Pénin called www.tombes-sepultures.com which specialize in locating the tombs of famous people in France. The period covered is usually 17th, 18th  and 19th centuries. I often wonder where is so and so buried, a famous name does not necessarily have a famous grave. Each entry gives you the story of the person and how it ended with often some strange family detail about the burial. One entry recently was about the French Revolution (Civil War) and how the Kings and Queens of France buried in the St-Denis Cathedral were dug up and their tombs smashed. Some with vivid description of the cadaver, like that of Louis XV whose body was black and gave out a powerful stench despite the fact that he had died some 17 years prior.

This week it is about the family Sanson, who for 7 generations where the Official Executioner of France, from 1688 to 1847. A profession that no longer exist, but a profession nonetheless required for putting to death the great and the not so great of France who had been condemned by the State. Official Executioner was a title given by the King and then at the Revolution by the Committee in charge. It was  a paid job with honours and benefits. One benefit was on the death of the Executioner, he was entitled to a Funeral Mass with full Civilian Honours. So for 159 years the Sanson, from fathers to sons where in charge of executing by whatever means decreed, prisoners. They not only exercised their profession in Paris but also in several other cities of France. The head of the Family usually had Paris and his sons had other cities, some  sons were also helpers in the putting to death of a condemned person. They were responsible for maintaining the tools of their trade and setting up the scaffolds etc ensuring that all would go well.

A very grim business and not always a quick affair, sometimes in the 17th and 18th centuries executions which were a public spectacle required some showmanship. However amongst the duty of the Executioner, he had to meet with the condemned prior to the execution, they would have a surreal conversation about what was to take place and the condemned could make a request that he be dispatched quickly if possible, often giving the Executioner a sum of money. One of the Sanson was known for his consideration and kindness toward the condemned person, his job was to put them to death not to make them suffer unduly or turn a public execution into butchery.

It was Charles-Henri Sanson who had to execute King Louis XVI. Though he had been a revolutionary in 1789 by 1793 he had lost his appetite for the revolution and turned against it. In his opinion far too many innocent people had been condemned by comedy show trials, where the results were more important than the facts or the truth. When he was given the paper ordering the execution of the King, Charles-Henri Sanson said he felt faint and wanted to run. He knew the trial had been rigged against the Sovereign and Sanson was hoping for a last minute reprieve or a plot to free the king. This royal execution would haunt him for the rest of his days and in his will he left money so that a Mass could be said  monthly to ask God for forgiveness for this horrible business.

Sanson’s son would execute 9 months later Queen Marie-Antoinette, who was leaving behind two young children. The day of the execution the Parisian crowds were in an ugly mood and sullen, very much against putting the Queen to death. He also dispatched other revolutionaries like Danton and Robespierre. He like other members of his family are buried around Paris in churches or in cemeteries amongst other dignitaries.  We do not know much about the Sanson family except for the journals and correspondence they left behind, they had a job to do and it required a certain amount of discretion.

 

 

 

You do the math

Tags

1864, Canada., champagne, Charlottetown, Conference, Constitution, dancing, drinking, Fathers of Confederation, France, PEI, Spo, USA, Washington

There was 31 delegates at the Charlottetown Conference in 1864 and 17 tons of Champagne on the SS Victoria which brought the delegates to PEI. That is an awful lot of Champagne for one conference on writing up the Canadian Constitution and making a deal to united the colonies into one Country, classic case of In Vino Veritas. Though you will be told that the delegates had their meetings at Province House the Seat of the Legislature, most meetings took place at the Cross Key Tavern on Queen Street and the Bar Keep was both keeping the minutes of the deliberations and serving drinks. All this while the Circus was in town for the first time in 20 years. Unlike France and its bloody civil war dubbed a revolution, or the American tax revolt of 1776 with unhappy landowners like G. Washington and co., we chose to have a party and a stiff drink with much dancing and food every night. They call Canada boring, I cannot think of another country born this way.

This rondelle with snippet of information can be found at the Memorial to the Fathers of Confederation. Canadians are a funny lot.

The Fathers of Confederation at Fanningbank, the Official Residence of the Lieutenant Governor of PEI in Charlottetown.

In 2016 some 152 years later on the same veranda of Fanningbank, Dr. Spo trying to call the Fathers of Confederation on his iPhone, unbelievable.

The front Porch of Fanningbank today, not much changed at all.