The Wet Nurse's Tale by Erica Eisdorfer

I was a bit reluctant to read this at first, as it didn't seem all that interesting. I'm glad I changed my mind! The Wet Nurse's Tale is indeed an interesting one, as well as touching at times. We follow, Susan Rose, a "promiscuous, lovable, plump and scheming" country woman who works as a scullery maid for a wealthy family. A dalliance with the young master of the house leaves her pregnant, but the baby soon dies and so, after resigning her post, decides to put her "best assets" to work and becomes a wet nurse to other wealthy families like her mother did. While working for her latest family, she becomes involved with a Jewish dentist and again falls pregnant, but this time, her child becomes part of a family scandal and Susan must use all her wit and daring to get him back. A fresh take on life, motherhood, and society in Victorian England, I very highly recommend this book and give it 4 out of 5 stars.

Classical Musique Macabre

Recently, I was on Itunes looking up an album called Classics From the Crypt when I found an album called The 50 Darkest Pieces of Classical Music for $5.99. Seeing this made me very happy as it was both "dark" and under six bucks (I had $6 and some change left to spend on there), so I snapped it up and have been quite pleased with my find. Among the tracks are a few of my faves, such as Carmina Burana: O Fortuna by Carl Orff, Sonata No. 2 in B-Flat Minor for Piano, Op. 35: III. Marche funébre (Funeral March): Lento by Frederic Chopin, and The Valkyrie: Ride of the Valkyries by Richard Wagner and many others from several different composers like Mozart, Beethoven, Handel and Vivaldi. For even more, Amazon has The 99 Darkest Pieces Of Classical Music and I plan on adding the ones I didn't get from here when I can. Another album Amazon recommends is The Most Frightening Music in the Universe which also seems pretty good, then there's 99 Must Have Halloween Classics and The Darkest Classical Piano Pieces. All these albums are perfect for this time of year, and if you're into the darker side of classical like I am, I highly reccomend adding them to your collection!

Film Review: The Young Victoria

Released back in 2009, this well done film stars Emily Blunt as the soon to be queen, and Rupert Friend as Prince Albert who would be the love of her life. I loved the costuming in this, and the acting did both characters justice. The story begins a year or two before Victoria's accension to the throne and chronicles her adjustment to wearing the crown, meeting Albert, the deepening of their love for each other, and even the birth of their first child, Victoria, the Princess Royal. Also included: one of Victoria's early asassination attempts...something she'd have to deal with a few times during her long reign. If you're a fan of the Victorian era, the queen who inspired it, British royalty and/or history, and, of course, the 1800s, and you have yet to see this film, please do! For anyone else who's seen it, feel free to leave your thoughts below. I give The Young Victoria 3 1/2 out of 5 stars.

Coloring and Paper Doll Fun-18th Century

More paper dolls and a coloring book, this time from the 1700's.Though a few that crossed over were posted last time, here's a few more I found that I find relevent:

French Baroque and Rococo Fashions

Colonial and Early American Fashions Coloring Book

Colonial Fashions Paper Dolls

American Family of the Colonial Era Paper Dolls

Enjoy them should you get any!

Coloring and Paper Doll Fun-19th Century

Being the dedicated follower of fashion that I am, I have a collection of paper dolls by Tom Tierney and decided to look on Amazon for ones depicting the 19th century by him. These are what I found:

Empire Fashions Coloring Book

Empire Costumes Paper Dolls

Fashions of the Regency Period Paper Dolls

Pride and Prejudice Paper Dolls

Little Women Paper Dolls

Civil War Fashions Coloring Book

Victorian Fashions Coloring Book

Early Victorian Costumes Paper Dolls

Great Fashion Designs of the Victorian Era Paper Dolls

Hoop Skirts and Crinoline Paper Dolls

Sherlock Holmes Paper Dolls

Late Victorian and Edwardian Fashions Coloring Book

High Victorian Fashions Paper Dolls

Late Victorian Costumes Paper Dolls

Great Fashion Designs of the Belle Epoque Paper Dolls

Fashions of the Gilded Age Paper Dolls

Newport Fashions of the Gilded Age Paper Dolls

Elegant Debutante Gowns of the 1800s Paper Dolls

Fashions of the Old South Coloring Book

Fashions of the Old South Paper Dolls

Southern Belles Paper Dolls

Southern Belle Ball Gowns Paper Dolls

There's also some paper dolls depicting American families:

Federal Period

Pioneer

Civil War Era

Of the Confederacy

Victorian Era

Of the 1890s

Should you get any, I hope you enjoy them!

Marie Antoinette

Ah, Marie...the French Revolution's favorite scapegoat and defecit queen extraordinare was born November 2, 1755. Much maligned throughout history, in recent times historians have been able to paint her in a more favorable light: yes, she spent wastefully and was a bit nieve about the plight of her people, but in fairness to her, she (and her equally doomed husband Louis XVI) was not really prepared to rule and raised somewhat isolated from the common man's burdens. This, of course, failed to save her, and she was sent to the guillotine on October 16, 1793. Here's a rundown of the books I have and/or know of:

Imagine that, on the night before she is to die under the blade of the guillotine, Marie Antoinette leaves behind in her prison cell a diary telling the story of her life—from her privileged childhood as Austrian Archduchess to her years as glamorous mistress of Versailles to the heartbreak of imprisonment and humiliation during the French Revolution.
Carolly Erickson takes the reader deep into the psyche of France's doomed queen: her love affair with handsome Swedish diplomat Count Axel Fersen, who risked his life to save her; her fears on the terrifying night the Parisian mob broke into her palace bedroom intent on murdering her and her family; her harrowing attempted flight from France in disguise; her recapture and the grim months of harsh captivity; her agony when her beloved husband was guillotined and her young son was torn from her arms, never to be seen again.
Erickson brilliantly captures the queen's voice, her hopes, her dreads, and her suffering. We follow, mesmerized, as she reveals every detail of her remarkable, eventful life—from her teenage years when she began keeping a diary to her final days when she awaited her own bloody appointment with the guillotine.

Paris, 1774. The dashing nobleman meets nineteen-year-old Marie Antoinette at a masquerade ball. As their relationship deepens at Versailles, Fersen discovers the court’s secrets, even the startling erotic details of Marie Antoinette’s marriage. But this intimacy is disrupted when he leaves to join the American Revolution. When he returns in 1783, he finds France on the brink of disintegration. After the Revolution of 1789, the royal family is moved to the Tuileries and suffers increasingly harsh captivity. After a failed attempt to liberate them, Fersen goes home to Sweden where he soon meets his own tragic end: his fate is symbolic of the violent pace with which of the eighteenth century’s events transformed European culture.

Raised alongside her numerous brothers and sisters by the formidable empress of Austria, ten-year-old Maria Antonia knew that her idyllic existence would one day be sacrificed to her mother’s political ambitions. What she never anticipated was that the day in question would come so soon.
Before she can journey from sunlit picnics with her sisters in Vienna to the glitter, glamour, and gossip of Versailles, Antonia must change everything about herself in order to be accepted as dauphine of France and the wife of the awkward teenage boy who will one day be Louis XVI. Yet nothing can prepare her for the ingenuity and influence it will take to become queen.
Filled with smart history, treacherous rivalries, lavish clothes, and sparkling jewels, Becoming Marie Antoinette will utterly captivate fiction and history lovers alike.

Paris, 1774. At the tender age of eighteen, Marie Antoinette ascends to the French throne alongside her husband, Louis XVI. But behind the extravagance of the young queen’s elaborate silk gowns and dizzyingly high coiffures, she harbors deeper fears for her future and that of the Bourbon dynasty.
From the early growing pains of marriage to the joy of conceiving a child, from her passion for Swedish military attaché Axel von Fersen to the devastating Affair of the Diamond Necklace, Marie Antoinette tries to rise above the gossip and rivalries that encircle her. But as revolution blossoms in America, a much larger threat looms beyond the gilded gates of Versailles—one that could sweep away the French monarchy forever.

Versailles, 1789. As the burgeoning rebellion reaches the palace gates, Marie Antoinette finds her privileged and peaceful life swiftly upended by violence. Once her loyal subjects, the people of France now seek to overthrow the crown, placing the heirs of the Bourbon dynasty in mortal peril.
Displaced to the Tuileries Palace in Paris, the royal family is propelled into the heart of the Revolution. There, despite a few staunch allies, they are surrounded by cunning spies and vicious enemies. Yet despite the political and personal threats against her, Marie Antoinette remains, above all, a devoted wife and mother, standing steadfastly by her husband, Louis XVI, and protecting their young son and daughter. And though the queen secretly attempts to arrange her family’s rescue from the clutches of the rebels, she finds that they can neither outrun the dangers encircling them nor escape their shocking fate.

Marie Antoinette was a child of fourteen when her mother, the Empress of Austria, arranged for her to leave her family and her country to become the wife of the fifteen-year-old Dauphin, the future King of France. Coming of age in the most public of arenas—eager to be a good wife and strong queen—she warmly embraces her adopted nation and its citizens. She shows her new husband nothing but love and encouragement, though he repeatedly fails to consummate their marriage and in so doing is unable to give what she and the people of France desire most: a child and an heir to the throne. Deeply disappointed and isolated in her own intimate circle, and apart from the social life of the court, she allows herself to remain ignorant of the country's growing economic and political crises, even as poor harvests, bitter winters, war debts, and poverty precipitate rebellion and revenge. The young queen, once beloved by the common folk, becomes a target of scorn, cruelty, and hatred as she, the court's nobles, and the rest of the royal family are caught up in the nightmarish violence of a murderous time called "the Terror."

With penetrating insight and with wondrous narrative skill, Sena Jeter Naslund offers an intimate, fresh, heartbreaking, and dramatic reimagining of this truly compelling woman that goes far beyond popular myth—and she makes a bygone time of tumultuous change as real to us as the one we are living in now.

At the age of fifteen, Marie Antoinette, beautiful and charming bride to the impotent Dauphin, is plunged into the intrigue of Versailles. Frivolous and reckless, she flouts the strict and demanding etiquette of the glittering court, and discovers the true nature of love, hate and jealousy.
But the clouds of revolution are overhead, and Marie Antoinette, who only wishes to enjoy life, learns too late that the price of her enjoyment is very high...

Aka Jean Plaidy

The affair of the Diamond Necklace shook the throne of France and, some say, precipitated the French Revolution and so helped to bring Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette to the guillotine. But why did these fantastic and ultimately sensational events fail so neatly into place? Why should a prince of the Royal House of France become so credulous and without question play the almost incredible part prepared for him? Why was an ambitious and predatory woman allowed to steal that famous piece of jewellery that represented a fortune? Who were the secret instigators of the plot?

In this novel Jean Plaidy offers one solution to an historical mystery, the motives behind which have long puzzled students and amateur detectives of history.

The story of Marie Antoinette and King Louis XVI. In this work of historical fiction, all of the characters were actual people The incidents, situations and conversations are based on reality. It is the story of the martyred King Louis XVI and his Queen, Antoinette. The fruit of years of research, the book corrects many of the popular misconceptions of the royal couple, which secular and modernist historians have tried so hard to promote. Louis and Antoinette can only be truly understood in view of the Catholic teachings to which they adhered and within the context of the sacrament of matrimony. It was the graces of this sacramental life that gave them the strength to remain loyal to the Church, and to each other, in the face of crushing disappointments, innumerable humiliations, personal and national tragedy, and death itself. Theirs is not a conventional love story; indeed it is more than a love story. The fortitude they each displayed at the very gates of hell is a source of inspiration for all Christians who live in troubled times.

A novel about Madame Royal

Some recommended on-fiction books

One of history's most misunderstood figures, Marie Antoinette represents the extravagance and the decadence of pre-Revolution France. Yet there was an innocence about Antoinette, thrust as a child into the chillingly formal French court.

France's iconic queen, Marie Antoinette, wrongly accused of uttering the infamous "Let them eat cake," was alternately revered and reviled during her lifetime. For centuries since, she has been the object of debate, speculation, and the fascination so often accorded illustrious figures in history. Married in mere girlhood, this essentially lighthearted child was thrust onto the royal stage and commanded by circumstance to play a significant role in European history. Antonia Fraser's lavish and engaging portrait excites compassion and regard for all aspects of the queen, immersing the reader not only in the coming-of-age of a graceful woman, but in the culture of an unparalleled time and place.

Here's some non-fiction ones I don't have, but have seen:

As perhaps the most preferred servant and lady-in-waiting in the French court, Henriette Campan was in a fine position to observe and comment on the affairs of the court. As a close confidante of Marie Antoinette, she offers readers insight into the Queen's character, revealing a nuanced person whose reputation for arrogance and disdain is perhaps undeserved.
In this detailed and eloquent account of one of the most tumultuous places and periods of European history, we are thrust into the palaces and opulence of the court. Daily life, from administration of the Kingdom to various meetings and discussions between guests and courtiers, allows Campan to build a compelling atmosphere.
Much of the biography is occupied not with the upheaval of the era, but of the characters and behaviors of the aristocracy in France. We hear of how Louis XVI and various other nobles conducted themselves and ruled, what their traits were and how the brewing discontent among the population gradually turned from a matter of minor concern, to a major crisis, to spelling the end of the French monarchy.
It is in this book's later chapters that arguably the most drama ensues; the executions, first of the king and later of Marie Antoinette itself, are described by Campan. The final, unhappy months of Antoinette's life are remembered by her most trusted and preferred servant: Campan describes the emotions of the Queen as her fortunes decline amid the chaos and drama of political upheaval.

In MARIE ANTOINETTE, Evelyn Lever draws on a variety of resources, including diaries, letters, and firsthand accounts, to write this sumptuous, addictive delight. From family life in Vienna to the choke of the guillotine, this gripping work combines a fast-paced historical narrative with all the elements of scandalous fiction: Marie's wedding at Versailles to Louis XVI, the French court, boredom, hypocrisy, loneliness, allies, enemies, scandal, intrigue, sex, peasant riots, the fall of the Bastille, mob rule in Paris, imprisonment, and, finally, execution.
From primary source documents Lever fashions an insightful glimpse into the French court at Versailles. The characters of court are expertly drawn. There is the dashing Axel Fersen, Marie's great love; Maria Theresa, the scheming mother trying to place her daughter on the Hapsburg throne; the legendary Madame du Barry, lover to Louis XV; and, of course, Marie herself.
Luxuriously evocative of the Versailles court, historically sharp and witty, and detailing the compelling story of Marie Antoinette's life, Evelyn Lever's biography entrances readers.

When her carriage first crossed over from her native Austria into France, fourteen-year-old Marie Antoinette was taken out, stripped naked before an entourage, and dressed in French attire to please the court of her new king. For a short while, the young girl played the part.

But by the time she took the throne, everything had changed. In Queen of Fashion, Caroline Weber tells of the radical restyling that transformed the young queen into an icon and shaped the future of the nation. With her riding gear, her white furs, her pouf hairstyles, and her intricate ballroom disguises, Marie Antoinette came to embody--gloriously and tragically--all the extravagance of the monarchy.

Life at the court of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette has long captivated readers, drawn by accounts of the intrigues and pageantry that came to such a sudden and unexpected end. Stefan Zweig's Marie Antoinette: The Portrait of an Average Woman is a dramatic account of the guillotine's most famous victim, from the time when as a fourteen-year-old she took Versailles by storm, to her frustrations with her aloof husband, her passionate love affair with the Swedish Count von Fersen, and ultimately to the chaos of the French Revolution and the savagery of the Terror. An impassioned narrative, Zweig's biography focuses on the human emotions of the participants and victims of the French Revolution, making it both an engrossingly compelling read and a sweeping and informative history.

Marie-Antoinette, Daughter of the Caesars is about the life, death and legacy of Louis XVI's tragic Queen, based upon the author's thirty years of research. Whenever possible the historical persons speak for themselves out of memoirs and letters. Marie-Antoinette is seen in light of her Imperial heritage as a child of the Habsburg dynasty. Having assumed the crown of the Holy Roman Empire in the 1400’s, the crown which had originated with Charlemagne in the year 800, they were seen as the continuation of the Roman Empire of the West. The Habsburgs and their allies kept the Muslims from overrunning Europe at both the Battle of Lepanto in 1571 and at the battle of Vienna in 1683. The fall of Marie-Antoinette, as both Queen of France and the youngest daughter of the Imperial Family, is indicative of the end of Christian civilization and the birth of the secular state, which was the object of the French Revolution. Through her death, Marie-Antoinette has been dubbed “Martyred Queen of Christian Europe” for in killing her the revolutionaries also symbolically killed all that she represented, the ancient heritage of Christendom.

There's even a few non-fiction ones about her children:

Louis-Charles, Duc de Normandie, enjoyed a charmed early childhood in the gilded palace of Versailles. At the age of four, he became the dauphin, heir to the most powerful throne in Europe. Yet within five years he was to lose everything. Drawn into the horror of the French Revolution, his family was incarcerated and their fate thrust into the hands of the revolutionaries who wished to destroy the monarchy.

In 1793, when Marie Antoinette was beheaded at the guillotine, she left her adored eight-year-old son imprisoned in the Temple Tower. Far from inheriting a throne, the orphaned boy-king had to endure the hostility and abuse of a nation. Two years later, the revolutionary leaders declared Louis XVII dead. No grave was dug, no monument built to mark his passing.

Immediately, rumors spread that the prince had, in fact, escaped from prison and was still alive. Others believed that he had been murdered, his heart cut out and preserved as a relic. As with the tragedies of England's princes in the Tower and the Romanov archduchess Anastasia, countless "brothers" soon approached Louis-Charles's older sister, Marie-Therese, who survived the revolution. They claimed not only the dauphin's name, but also his inheritance. Several "princes" were plausible, but which, if any, was the real heir to the French throne?

The Lost King of France is a moving and dramatic tale that interweaves a pivotal moment in France's history with a compelling detective story that involves pretenders to the crown, royalist plots and palace intrigue, bizarre legal battles, and modern science. The quest for the truth continued into the twenty-first century, when, thanks to DNA testing, the strange odyssey of a stolen heart found within the royal tombs brought an exciting conclusion to the two-hundred-year-old mystery of the lost king of France.

In December 1795, at midnight on her seventeenth birthday, Marie-Thérèse, the only surviving child of Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI, escaped from Paris's notorious Temple Prison. To this day many believe that the real Marie-Thérèse, traumatized following her family's brutal execution during the Reign of Terror, switched identities with an illegitimate half sister who was often mistaken for her twin. Was the real Marie-Thérèse spirited away to a remote castle to live her life as the woman called "the Dark Countess," while an imposter played her role on the political stage of Europe? Now, two hundred years later, using handwriting samples, DNA testing, and an undiscovered cache of Bourbon family letters, Nagel finally solves this mystery. She tells the remarkable story in full and draws a vivid portrait of an astonishing woman who both defined and shaped an era. Marie-Thérèse's deliberate choice of husbands determined the map of nineteenth-century Europe. Even Napoleon was in awe and called her "the only man in the family." Nagel's gripping narrative captures the events of her fascinating life from her very public birth in front of the rowdy crowds and her precocious childhood to her hideous time in prison and her later reincarnation in the public eye as a saint, and, above all, her fierce loyalty to France throughout.

In addition to her role as queen of France, Marie Antoinette (1755–1793) could justly claim to rule the 18th-century fashion world. Directly behind her throne stood a savvy dressmaker, Rose Bertin, who helped transform the young Antoinette from a foreign princess into the epitome of French fashion and the most glamorous woman of her era.
Two figures portraying the queen and her dressmaker appear in this lavish paper doll collection, along with fifteen extraordinary costumes. These elegant ensembles attest to Rose Bertin's skills as a designer and her place as an innovator in fashion history. Her shop served as a center for the beau monde, and its displays of garments for an international clientele mark the first recorded showings of a couture collection. No one acted as a more conspicuous model than the ill-fated queen, who abandoned hoop skirts and monumental hairstyles in favor of her trademark style, magnificent renditions of the simple garb worn by shepherdesses and milkmaids.
These dazzling costumes, scrupulously researched and meticulously rendered, come with detailed descriptive notes, providing a treasury of historic fashions for paper doll fans and costume enthusiasts.

The French Revolution sought to change daily life itself. This book looks at the thirteen years between 1789-1802 that experienced the Terror, banning of the aristocracy, and the rearrangement of the calendar. No part of French life was left untouched during this incredible period of turmoil and warfare, from women's role in the family to men's role in the state. Art and theater were invigorated and harnessed for political purposes. Subtleties in one's dress could mean the difference between life and death. The first modern mass army was created. Chapters include the physical make-up of France; the social and political background of the revolution; the First Republic; religion, church and state; urban life; rural life; family life; the fringe society; clothes and fashion; food and drink; the role of women; military life; education; health and medicine; and writers, artists, musicians and entertainment. Anderson breathes life into the day-to-day lives of those living during the French Revolution.

Greenwood's Daily Life through History series looks at the everyday lives of common people. This book will illuminate the lives of those living during the French Revolution and provide a basis for further research. Black and white photographs, maps, and charts are interspersed throughout the text to assist readers. Reference features include a timeline of historic events, glossaries of terms and names, an annotated bibliography of print and electronic resources suitable for high school and college student research, and an index.

The early music show Harmonium did a Marie special you can listen to here: Harmonium M. A. episode

 Royal Blood podcast, episode 1

Royal Blood podcast, episode 13

Marie Antoinette, pt. 1

Marie Antoinette, pt. 2 

Children of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette

  As I said before, this is most likely just a small list of what's out there to try, and I highly recommend any fan of Marie, royalty, the French Revolution and/or French history, and the 18th century to check them out. What's your favorite book on Marie Antoinette? Any you suggest that you don't see listed? Any thoughts on one of history's favorite "bad queens" ? Do leave your comments below, and Vive le France!