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- [00:00]
Afwa Hirsch
Wondery subscribers can binge seasons of Legacy early and ad free. Join Wondery in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts.
- [00:18]
Peter Frankenbaum
Hello and welcome to the final episode of our series on Marie Antoinette. We left you in the last episode with Marie Antoinette devastated by the execution of her husband, Louis xvi, who had been king of France. After a disastrous escape bid, life has taken an increasingly sinister turn for the royal family. Fleeing a bloodthirsty mob, they've thrown themselves on the mercy of the revolutionary government. And this is not a time of mercy.
- [00:47]
Afwa Hirsch
The monarchy has been abolished, the king tried and executed. He leaves behind his queen, the most hated woman in France. So what now for Marie Antoinette and her children.
- [01:12]
Peter Frankenbaum
From Wondery and Goal Hanger? I'm Peter Frankenbaum. I'm Afwa Hersh and this is Legacy, the show that tells the lives of the most extraordinary men and women ever to have lived and asks if they have the reputation that they deserve.
- [01:35]
Afwa Hirsch
This is Marie Antoinette, Episode four, the Grim Finale.
- [01:52]
Narrator
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- [02:50]
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- [03:35]
Peter Frankenbaum
She no longer had any hope left in her heart or distinguished between life and death. Those are the words of Marie Therese, Marie Antoinette's 14 year old daughter, describing her mother in the days after the execution of her father. Marie Antoinette at this point is eating little and she rarely speaks. The Widow Capet, as she is now known. She appears completely stunned with grief, which.
- [04:00]
Afwa Hirsch
Isn'T surprising, Peter, putting together everything that they've gone through. And it's not just the murder of your friend, the Princess Lamballe, your husband, but the extent of their fall. They went from being so exalted, so untouchable, so elite, to being at the mercy of the most unpredictable public ever really. And being a mother in that situation and having to worry about the fate of your children is particularly harrowing. She still has to take care of her family.
- [04:32]
Peter Frankenbaum
Do you get a sense that she has a sort of, I suppose what we might call a functional relationship with Louis? Do you think it was a close relationship? Do you think it was one of circumstance and distance? And now actually it's not so much the loss of her husband, it's the fear for herself and her family.
- [04:46]
Afwa Hirsch
He's the only partner she's ever known as an adult. I mean, she's been married to him since she was 14.
- [04:52]
Peter Frankenbaum
But there is one person that she's been very fond of.
- [04:55]
Afwa Hirsch
She has a little feather in her cap for Count Bearson. Well, there he is, the Swede who is devoted to her actually still now, has not abandoned her in this time of her greatest need. He writes to her in February 1793. I am beginning to hope a little as he works away at trying to secure something to save her.
- [05:19]
Peter Frankenbaum
And in fact there are quite a few other reasons why Marie Antoinette's fate has not yet been sealed. So there aren't immediate demands, for example, for the head of the Queen, or rather Widow Capet. There's some evidence that Danton, who is one of the key revolutionary leaders, is trying to do a deal to swap her for French prisoners who are held by the Austrians. And in fact, what exile might look like, what her future might look like has still not been decided, partly because there are lots of different views about that. So even now she's not doomed, but her health is really deteriorating. She's only 37, but historians speculate she may have been suffering from hemorrhages or fibroids or perhaps even early signs of womb cancer. But she's really not well.
- [06:01]
Afwa Hirsch
Something is really wrong. She's losing blood. She's obviously a shadow of her former self under Incredible strain. And that doesn't help. Nothing can create sympathy for her at this point. She's that hated that even the sight of her diminished state doesn't seem to change anything. And in February 1793, France declares war on on Britain. There's this paranoid belief that conflict is inevitable against Britain, so they might as well strike the first blow.
- [06:35]
Peter Frankenbaum
But the first strike on Britain is a disaster. First, it creates a war economy. Second, it creates more fear. And third, as day follows night, all the first strike ideas sounded better on the planning board than they do in the field. So it's defeat after defeat. And as news of these setbacks reach Paris, the mood darkens. And that fans reports of royalists uprisings in the vende. And in those kinds of circumstances, it's not completely unusual or surprising that hardliners offering very stark solutions start to take power. And Robespierre is the coming man in this situation.
- [07:12]
Afwa Hirsch
We always see this in history, that when things are going badly for those in power, they love a scapegoat, somebody whose head they can offer on a spike that distracts the public from their own failings, from bad decisions, from the fact that things aren't going to plan. And who fits that bill better than Marie Antoinette, so long demonized in France, still alive, a conspicuous symbol of everything the revolution was trying to cleanse from the French consciousness. And Robespierre at this point reminds everyone that Marie Antoinette is still alive, even though she is, he says, no less guilty than Louis, no less accused by the nation. He demands she must also be tried.
- [07:55]
Peter Frankenbaum
That's part of a climate of further crackdowns on aristocrats. So in April, a new Committee on Public safety, led by Danton, starts to target the elite again. In May, the Jacobins were in more or less total control of the Convention. In the middle of the night of the 3rd of July, commissioners arrive at the temple with devastating news for Marie Antoinette, which is they're going to take her son Louis away from her care.
- [08:19]
Afwa Hirsch
This seems to have been prompted by reports of an escape plan, although there's not really evidence that one necessarily existed. Although at this point, Marie Antoinette is really now trying to do anything she can to think of a way out for her and her family. And it's a really harrowing, violent separation. Marie Antoinette literally refuses to physically let go of her son. Her son clings to her. It takes an hour to separate them. And it's only when Marie Therese, her daughter, is threatened with death that Marie Antoinette gives in and allows them to take her son away.
- [08:58]
Peter Frankenbaum
And although he's taken away, out of sight. Marie Antoinette can hear him sobbing at night. Louis is put in the care of Antoine Simon, who's a cobbler in his 50s and a hardline leading member of the Paris Commune. Louis is beaten. If he cries, he's treated roughly. Sometimes he's plied with wine, he's questioned. And dark suggestions, which we'll come back to, are also put into his head.
- [09:20]
Afwa Hirsch
It's really hard to think of a worse punishment to have your child abducted and then kept within earshot while he's mistreated, tortured even. And that would really push anyone, I think, to the brink. And Marie Antoinette is already in such a weakened and distressed state. So that when, in July 1793, Austrian forces are once again advancing into France and Paris is again under threat from Austria. The Austrian woman's crimes, this is how Marie Antoinette's track record is described at this point, are discussed in the Convention, and one deputy describes her as the Widow Capet. The shame of humanity and of her sex. That's how reviled she is.
- [10:06]
Peter Frankenbaum
Now they come for Marie Antoinette at 2 in the morning on the 2nd of August 1793. She's allowed a brief farewell with her eldest child, Marie Therese, who's left in the care of Elizabeth, Louis XVI's sister. Marie Antoinette is hurried down the stairs of the tower, banging her head on the last beam. She's taken across the courtyard and into a carriage, and the carriage, heavily guarded, crosses the Pont Notre Dame and delivers her to the Conciergerie prison.
- [10:34]
Afwa Hirsch
Her escort knocks on the door with their bayonets and prisoner number 280, as she is now known, is charged with conspiring against France and admitted into the prison. When she's asked her name, she simply says, look at me.
- [10:50]
Peter Frankenbaum
For Marie Antoinette, it's the beginning of the end. Marie Antoinette spends the last 76 days of her life in the Conciergerie. It's on the banks of the Seine, and if you saw the opening ceremony of the Paris Olympics last year, you'll know exactly what we're talking about. In fact, the ceremony featured rows of headless Marie Antoinettes dressed in red and singing from the windows of the former prison.
- [11:35]
Afwa Hirsch
This is actual imprisonment for the first time. She's in a cell. It has a bed, a table, two chairs and a bucket. She's watched by two guards round the clock. Nothing happens in private.
- [11:49]
Peter Frankenbaum
She's not allowed to write, but she is given books to read. She loves the Travels of Captain Cook, that's given to her by a jailer, but There are still plots Aphra to rescue her. Come on. This is bound to come good.
- [12:02]
Afwa Hirsch
This time, Count Thurston does not abandon her in her hour of greatest.
- [12:07]
Peter Frankenbaum
I love this guy.
- [12:08]
Afwa Hirsch
He's so faithful.
- [12:09]
Peter Frankenbaum
I love this guy.
- [12:10]
Afwa Hirsch
He is still trying to see if a troop of dragoons can ride into Paris, stage a smash and grab operation. I am not a big subscriber to misogynistic fairy tales, but if there was ever an aspirational knight in shining armor. Count Fersen.
- [12:29]
Peter Frankenbaum
We all need a Count Fersen in our lives. One of the schemes that Count Fersen hatches is called the Carnation Plot, which is sort of a wonderful idea, really. A message being hidden in a flower? Possibly. It's a little bit over elaborate, but it doesn't get anywhere. I don't know what Marie Antoinette's state of mind must have been like by now. Her son taken from her, she's been separated from her daughter, her husband dead. But October 1793, Marie Antoinette is put on trial and she's given little more than a day's notice to prepare her defence. But I suppose no matter how long she'd been given, I'm not sure it would have made a blind bit of difference.
- [13:09]
Afwa Hirsch
October 14, 1793. The Conciergerie, Paris. In a vaulted limestone chamber, Marie Antoinette listens to the Revolutionary Tribunal's charges. After five hours in the chair, her body is stiff and sore. Is it not true that you conspired to give French gold to your brother in Austria in order to weaken the nation? In a weary voice, Marie Antoinette repeats the answer she's been giving all day. I do not believe so. A murmur of outrage passes through the crowd as people crane their necks for a better look. She wonders if it's all just a formality. It seems like the decision has already been made. Next, Commune member Jacques Albert takes the floor. He stares at her and says, I recently spent some time with your young son.
- [13:59]
Narrator
Son?
- [14:00]
Afwa Hirsch
Louis Charles. Marie Antoinette begins to feel uneasy. Albert goes on. He asserts that you and his aunt engaged him in indecent practices. Blood roars in her ears as Herbert details the allegations that she abused her son to satisfy her own unnatural desires. She had assumed she knew the depths of the Commune depravity, but nothing could have prepared her for this. She scans the faces of the crowd, looking for some trace of pity. Surely no one can believe these things. She thinks she can see perhaps just a little softening in the expressions of the women. When finally called on for an answer, she musters her remaining energy I appeal to all mothers present in this court. If I have made no reply, it's because nature itself refuses to answer such a charge brought against a mother. Her fate may be sealed, but perhaps she can yet make a case that the evil Austrian she Wolf is, like so many women, simply a victim of circumstance.
- [15:15]
Peter Frankenbaum
It's a classic show trial. We've seen lots of those in the Soviet Union or in Mao's China, or in the Khmer worlds of Paul Pot. The question is, why bother doing a trial in the first place? And if you're going to do a trial, why cook up something so obviously ludicrous? You can accuse Marianne Antoinette for spending too much money. You can accuse her for believing in a monarchy, you can accuse her of being a foreigner. But cooking up fake charges is deliberately a way of humiliating and degrading. And it's not just cruel, it's a way of not delivering justice. Which, of course, is the irony of a trial in the first place.
- [15:48]
Afwa Hirsch
It always smacks of the absence of a real case. As you said, there are things that people had a legitimate grievance about, the unfairness of the royal system, how much money they spent, how much luxury they enjoyed. But it seems that wasn't enough to rally the crowd to believe she deserved to be executed, that they needed to knock her off the plinth of humanity, that she needed to be seen as a monster who abused her own child in order to make it stick. And so, in a way, in a really perverse way, this kind of reflects well on her that they had to stoop so low to concoct these charges, because nothing that was true or that was provable was enough.
- [16:31]
Peter Frankenbaum
And what about going for her as a woman and the way in which the revolution starts to treat and categorize women? There's something in that, too. It's not just Marie Antoinette who's being targeted.
- [16:41]
Afwa Hirsch
This is a revolution, but it's not one that's attempting to overturn the patriarchy. Because the jury is male, the court is all male. The revolution is beginning to undo some of the earlier gains that women had who were actually active in fomenting revolutionary ideology. Early on, the Jacobins will ban all women's clubs that have flourished since the revolution. And by the end of October, this idea that you can trace to Russo and many of the thinkers before him, that women belong in the home, that the domestic sphere is their realm, that they are not equal, is really taking over the revolutionary mindset. And that, I think, is a really important context for why Marie Antoinette is treated Worse than Louis. Louis was given time to prepare a defense. He was given access to a lawyer. He was treated with dignity even when on trial. He wasn't dehumanized and humiliated in the same way as Marie Antoinette. Even the way that he was held in the prison, even the way he was transported. Marie Antoinette is stripped of everything, every dignity and every privilege.
- [17:41]
Peter Frankenbaum
And she doesn't seem to realise what the cards are showing and still seems to think there's a chance that she might be sent into exile. Maybe she's just fooling herself on purpose. But in the early hours of 16 October 1793, Marie Antoinette is sentenced to death. At 4am, she's taken back to her cell. She is to face the guillotine that same day.
- [18:07]
Afwa Hirsch
Back in her cell, she is allowed to write her last letters. So she writes to Elizabeth, Louis's sister, who's still looking after her daughter, Marie Therese. I have just been condemned to death. Not a shameful death that can only be for criminals. But in order to rejoin your brother, innocent like him, I hope to demonstrate the same firmness as he did. At the end. I am calm as people are, whose conscience is clear. My deepest regret is at having to abandon our poor children. You know I only lived on for them and for you, my good and tender sister. Adieu. My good and tender sister. May this letter reach you. Think of me always. I embrace you with all my heart, as well as those poor beloved children. My God, how heartrending it is to leave them forever.
- [18:56]
Peter Frankenbaum
That's beautifully written. You've got to hand that to her. I mean the dignity and the tenderness and the bravery. It's extraordinary. She writes to her son Louis as well, and instructs him to never try to avenge our deaths. And she writes to her daughter, urging her to forgive her brother the allegations that he'd made against his mother. I think that's pretty admirable. In the moment that she's facing her.
- [19:20]
Afwa Hirsch
Own death, she is spared no indignity. She's not allowed to see her children for a last time. She's not allowed to wear black. So she just dresses in a simple white dress, a white linen cap, black silk stockings and plum coloured shoes. She has her hair hacked off and despite her protests, her hands are bound as she waits for death. This frail woman all alone, who has really offered no resistance. It seems like it's done more to humiliate her and show how far she's fallen than for any real security need.
- [19:54]
Peter Frankenbaum
And a priest, Abbe Girard, says to her this Is the moment, Madame, to arm yourself with courage? She replies. Courage. The moment when my ills are going to end is not the moment when courage is going to fail me. And at 11am she's loaded into a cart. 16th of October, 1793 Rue de Rivoli, Paris. Jacqueline David flings open the balcony windows and scans the boulevard below. Already people have gathered along the route of the Queen's procession. Putting his sketch pad onto his knee, he lays out his pencils. He can hear from the noise in the distance that Marie Antoinette's cortege has left the Conciergerie. He looks down at the blank paper in front of him, imagining the responses to his sketch at the Jacobin Club. As a member of the National Convention, he personally voted for the King's execution and Marie Antoinette's. He takes a deep breath, thinking about the significance of today. The end of France's subjugation by tyranny. The procession has reached the street below. He hears shouts from the onlookers. Make way for the Austrian woman. Here she is, the infamous Antoinette. The cart is pulled by two heavy horses. On it, with her hands tied behind her back, Marie Antoinette sits facing backwards. She's wearing a plain dress with strands of white hair spilling from beneath her drawstring cap. As she passes, a woman spits at the convoy, shouting, long live the Republic. Jacques Louis waits for the cart to draw level until its passenger is in profile. Then, with a practiced hand, he marks the page with bold, short lines. His eyes flick between his model and the paper, taking in her sallow, sunken cheeks, drawn mouth and prominent lip. Her face is impassive until, outside the Tuileries, her former family residence. Her composure wavers, but she quickly regains her poise. As his outline comes together, Jacques Louis pushes down the tiny flicker of compassion he feels. He takes one last look at the doomed queen going to her death with such calm dignity. Then the cart turns the corner and she's gone.
- [22:38]
Afwa Hirsch
I've seen that sketch by Jacques Louis David Peter, and it is striking. It's such a simple line sketch, which in a way is fitting for somebody who's really had all of the adornment and ornamentation of their previous appearance stripped away. And it captures just how stark the change. She's so aged, she's so shrunken in a way, but yet she has her back straight. The famous posture, the grace, the dignity is also captured in this picture. She's both haggard and weathered, but also firm. And you can believe that it was almost a relief for her life. To be ending because her last few weeks and certainly months of life sound like a just living hell, frankly.
- [23:26]
Peter Frankenbaum
The images of her looking as plain as a woman can be. There's no hint of royalty or dignity about her, apart from her posture. But her fate of being guillotined and executed is not one that's unique to Marie antoinette. Around about 17,000 people died by the guillotine during the revolution. But even towards the end, her manners don't fail her. So she's supposed to even have stepped on her executioner's foot and apologized to him. These are her last words. Pardon me, sir, I did not do it on purpose. Sums up everything, doesn't it? Afwa.
- [23:57]
Afwa Hirsch
It is a summation of her life and a sad one.
- [24:01]
Peter Frankenbaum
It is sad, yeah. At a quarter past 12 on Wednesday 16 October 1793, the guillotine's blade falls. The executioner picks up Marie Antoinette's head and shows it to the crowd. She was 37 years old. Let's tie up a few loose ends before we consider Marie Antoinette's legacy. Affwain. Like we said, this isn't a story with happy endings.
- [24:50]
Afwa Hirsch
Her sister in law, Elizabeth, followed her to the guillotine less than a year later. Louis, her son, who it seems was pressured into making these allegations against his mother, who was being plied with alcohol and sometimes beaten by his jailers, dies of tuberculosis aged 10 in 1795, still in prison. And Count Fersen, her lover, who stayed loyal till the end, never stopped trying to rescue her. He's murdered by a mob in Stockholm.
- [25:21]
Peter Frankenbaum
No, now I'm sad. I'm saying it with a tongue in cheek, obviously. I do think it's pretty spectacular, his dedication and devotion. Marie Antoinette's daughter, Marie Therese survives the revolution and in 1795 she is part of a prisoner swap with the Austrians. And in one of those funny twists of history, among the revolutionary prisoners who is sent back to France is Jean Baptiste Drouet. Do you remember him?
- [25:46]
Afwa Hirsch
Affront I do. He was the one who spotted the royal family when they tried to escape and foiled their attempt by raising the alarm that the King was on the loose during the flight to Varennes.
- [25:58]
Peter Frankenbaum
Maria Therese comes back to Paris in 1814 and she witnesses her parents bodies being exhumed from a cemetery on the Rue d'anjou and placed in the royal vault in the Cathedral of St. Denis.
- [26:10]
Afwa Hirsch
Then she lives a long and fairly miserable lonely life. And I think says at the end of her life that she was never able to recover from the trauma of those early years. So she dies an elderly but bitter and traumatized woman, and all those who.
- [26:27]
Peter Frankenbaum
Were responsible for the horror, the persecution, the suffering, the death, Robespierre, Danton, Barnave, Fouquier, Tinville, the prosecutor during Marion Toinette's trial, and many, many more are themselves executed during the Reign of Terror that begins in 1793 and ends with Robespierre's execution in 1794. So it's total, total carnage.
- [26:50]
Afwa Hirsch
What's the quote, Peter? That the Revolution ate its own children.
- [26:54]
Peter Frankenbaum
Always does. It's a funny thing how that happens. But in France's case, the horror and violence in France gives birth to a new empire, new golden age in France, at least for a while under Napoleon, where the energy, the ambition and the vision of France takes us a very long way away from the streets of Paris being filled with heads rolling. I guess the main thing with Marie Antoinette is that she's bound up with the idea of the French Revolution. And the legacy of that stretches really far into the rise of Marxism and Engels and the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917, of course. But then later revolutions in the 20th century and what happens in 1789 across France, about the dismantling of hierarchies and the story of the king and queen are central in that idea about how to turn society upside down and on its head. So I guess, looking at it as a historian, it's that she's not a protagonist turning the wheels of history, but for all sorts of reasons, she is the absolute lightning rod that everything strikes. She's the single most famous person associated with the French Revolution. The way she's been treated by historians since has kept that. It's a lightning rod. I think it's a good word. It's kept it vibrant and alive. That's why she's such an important cultural icon. And so much gets projected onto her. Everybody knows her name. I'd have thought if you were to ask people the name of any French queen, she's number one ranked. That's partly to do with her death, but also with her life, is it not?
- [28:21]
Afwa Hirsch
Yeah, she's become a style icon, for sure. And it's interesting how each generation kind of reimagines her in their own image. As you said in the Sofia Coppola film, she's a kind of punk princess who becomes a French it girl at Versailles. And some people say that even today, as we record in France, it's indicative of someone's politics, whether you like Marie Antoinette or not, that conservatives highly regard her romanticize her, whereas the left still loathes her as a figure of privilege and corruption. And I think it's fascinating. That is a legacy, whether it's the one you would choose or not to still a byword for the kind of political allegiances that people have in such a completely different age to the one of her own lifetime.
- [29:11]
Peter Frankenbaum
You saw her detached head singing in the Paris Olympics, and that infuriated some and amused others. But in 1993, in the 200th anniversary of her death, there was a play staged in Paris which ended with the audience voting on what should happen to her. And some voted for exile, but some voted for execution. But either way, she was still found guilty. And it's quite hard to see exactly what it was that she did wrong. In a France that was spending too much money, made poor strategic decisions, had a king who didn't know what he was doing, including between the sheets, I.
- [29:43]
Afwa Hirsch
Think it's unbelievable that people would still vote for her execution now, even if you are really critical of the way class and privilege works in society. One of the things that actually really frustrates me with biographies about Marie Antoinette is they're so sympathetic to her often that they actually overlook the real suffering that was going on in France at the time. However, I think to personify her as everything that was wrong, to blame her much more than the male figures in this story tend to get blamed, is really unfair, and it's still unfair. And it's an ongoing manifestation of a very old misogyny that really wants to vilify women. They're the witch, they're the sinister voice in the ear. They're the profligate spender, they're the face and the body of corruption. And I think it's a really outdated view, and it's amazing that it persists.
- [30:33]
Peter Frankenbaum
So it's strange, though, that there's such a division of views. It's a while ago now, but Nancy Mitford, writing in 1955 in the Times about an exhibition stayed in Versailles to commemorate the anniversary of her birth, said it was crazy to hold an exhibition for a woman of monumental stupidity. And Marielle Tournetti says was frivolous without being funny. And yet that life of excess, the focus on fashion has also made her a style icon, not just for the May Antoinette movie. Sofia Coppola we talked about a couple of times, but also for designers like Christian Dior or Vivienne Westwood or Christine Lacroix. Trying to find a woman who epitomizes style spending and frivolity has A sort of flip side to it. So I wonder, after four episodes, looking at Marie Antoinette, what sense you have of her character, who she was, what she thought, what kind of person she was.
- [31:25]
Afwa Hirsch
I don't know if I'd actually like her if I was her contemporary, but I do get a sense of who she was. I think that she was quite a sensitive and empathetic person. She had her little causes, she would give money to charity, she would rescue people she stumbled upon who seemed poor and in need. She was completely unaware of the reality of money and financial pressure. And she wasn't generous from a place of really understanding the value of money. But she had an instinct to want to do nice things for people. She wanted to raise her own children at a time when they were whisked off with wet nurses and maids and nannies. She was somebody who had an instinct for like real one on one relationships and being intimate, whether that's with nature or with people. She loved children, for example. Even when she couldn't conceive herself when she was a young queen, she was always playing with the children in palace, wanting to be around them. She seems like someone who has quite a young spirit, who loved fashion and loved to have fun and be with her friends and also had her own mind. Because one of the problems for her was that she didn't really do the bidding of Austria to the extent that Austria wanted her to. But she also was perceived as too Austrian to ever be fully accepted in France, which is a really tricky place to be. She could have been more compliant to Austria. She could have done everything her mother told her. She didn't do that. And I think that took some pushback. She was trying to create her own life. She reminds me of those royal women, not the major royals, but the minor royals who are patrons of a few charities. Live the life of the super rich, but try to do good and have a sense of duty. And for me, this is my major takeaway from Marie Antoinette. I think she represents everything that is wrong with monarchy. Not in the sense that I think she deserved to be punished, even let alone executed. But monarchy is unfair to the people within it. Royalty is an unfair system. For royals, it's unfair to a child to be born into a family that uses your body and your womb and your sexuality to do deals, to make geopolitical moves, then demands that your allegiance be split between your home and your future kingdom. That is, puts you in a situation where you will become the face of social ills when people are dissatisfied with prevailing orders.
- [33:41]
Peter Frankenbaum
We did say at the beginning, you thought you'd come out swinging for Marriott toilet. So I wasn't expecting that, but not.
- [33:47]
Afwa Hirsch
For the reasons that people expect, not because I subscribe to the kind of cult of, oh, she was this glamorous, gorgeous princess. It's so unfair that they were mean to her. More that the whole system was so problematic, and she was used by it in a way that offends my sense of justice.
- [34:03]
Peter Frankenbaum
I think, with Marie Antoinette, what happens, and that is a function, I think, of her being a woman and a royal woman at this time, is that we don't really hear her voice. There's so much generated by people looking at her. And it's a reminder, I think, in history that if you don't have an ability to explain what you're thinking, everyone can use guesswork and they can project onto you what they want. Which is why fashion designers want to use her when it suits them or steampunk princesses, if you're Sofia Coppola, because turn somebody into whatever they are. Now, if you're being cynical, you'd say, that's the whole point. That's why no one normally writes books. If you're in a position of power because you don't want people to know what you think.
- [34:38]
Afwa Hirsch
I just think any society that tolerates a class of people not having the same rights as others is an unfair one and in a way that affects everyone in the end. And this is a great example. It started with beheading the king and Marie Antoinette, and it ended up beheading the revolutionaries and countless ordinary people who just got caught up on the wrong side. When you unleash that kind of bloodthirstiness and that desire to demonize people, you don't get to control where it ends.
- [35:04]
Peter Frankenbaum
I'll tell you, the single thing that I've always found most challenging and difficult about Marie Antoinette is, you know, I spent lots of time in France, and we've loved spending time in Paris and so on. And there is a personification of the ideal French woman that gets born in the age of the French Revolution. The personification of liberty, Marianne, who is the kind of. On all the flags used to be on the currency. You see her in every town hall. And her name. You don't need to be a genius. I mean, it's supposedly based on a barracks in southwest France. But if you're gonna call somebody, anything, Marie Anne, brackets, Toinette. The closeness of the ideal woman against the one who you behead, you think of all the names. Why Marianne is The one I'm supposed to look up to. And Marie Antoinette is the one who's vilified beyond all others. And it is the morality that this is what goodness looks like. Freedom on the one hand, privilege on the other. Duty on the one hand, to look after others by leading the masses into the revolution. And on the other hand, one who's only interested in herself and her husband and her children, but nobody else. And I think that those two twin versions of Marie Antoinette and Marianne and of France I find very contradictory, but quite thrilling to think about.
- [36:15]
Afwa Hirsch
If there is a morality tale, it's. That's what happens when men dictate what a good woman is. But it's essentially men sitting in judgment over a woman and saying, this is where we draw the line and this is the side of it that you are on. And so much of what she was condemned for are not on the whole things she actually did. They're things she was accused of, she was perceived as doing. It was conjecture, it was rumor, it was scandal. And the things she actually did are not that different from the ideal of Marianne. She did her duty. She was sent to Paris, she was sent to Versailles. She did bear children. She did stay by her husband's side. She did try to become friends. She did try to assimilate. She did what she was conditioned by the society to do, and she was executed for doing it exactly right.
- [37:05]
Peter Frankenbaum
Afwa, as always, pleasure and a privilege. Can I ask for your three words?
- [37:10]
Afwa Hirsch
You know, I always slightly hack this one. Okay, this is kind of four. I could say it in three.
- [37:15]
Peter Frankenbaum
Is Count Fersen in there?
- [37:17]
Afwa Hirsch
No. I'm a feminist. If I reduce her legacy to something about a man that she had a crush on.
- [37:22]
Peter Frankenbaum
You've done so well so far today.
- [37:24]
Afwa Hirsch
Tempting as that is. She didn't say that.
- [37:27]
Peter Frankenbaum
She didn't say that. Yeah. Okay, I'm going to go for mine are always much more lame and I don't think about them long enough. Famous, infamous, and I was going to say cake.
- [37:36]
Afwa Hirsch
Fashion, Peter.
- [37:38]
Peter Frankenbaum
Yeah, okay. Famous, infamous and fashion. There you go. Thank you for listening to this series of Legacy. Next week, we are back with a brand new character, someone whose name is still mentioned today as a shorthand for tyranny and violence, even though they lived nearly a thousand years ago.
- [38:01]
Afwa Hirsch
If you think you've heard Peter Sparkle, you have not yet heard him talk about Genghis Khan. Yes, we're going to unravel the man behind the legend. One of the greatest conquerors the world has ever known. Someone I learned most of what I know about by reading Peter's work, but did he have a softer side?
- [38:21]
Peter Frankenbaum
It's going to be fun, so join us for that next time on Legacy.
- [38:52]
Afwa Hirsch
Follow Legacy on the Wondery app, Amazon Music, or wherever you get your podcasts. You can binge seasons early and ad free right now by joining Wondery plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. Before you go, tell us about yourself by completing a short survey@wondery.com survey from wandery and goal hanger this is the fourth episode in our series about Marie Antoinette.
- [39:19]
Peter Frankenbaum
A quick note about our dialogue we can't know everything that was said or done behind closed doors, particularly when we go far back in history, but our scenes are written using the best available sources, so even if a scene or conversation has been recreated for dramatic effect, it still based on biographical research.
- [39:37]
Afwa Hirsch
We've used many sources for this series, including Marie Antoinette, the Journey by Antonia Fraser, the French Revolution, Daily Life by James M. Anderson, the palace of Versailles and Life in Revolutionary France, edited by Metta Harder and Jennifer Nayari Hoyer. Legacy is hosted by me, Afwa Hirsch.
- [39:57]
Peter Frankenbaum
And me Peter Frankenpen.
- [39:59]
Afwa Hirsch
Scene writing by Jack McCay for Goal.
- [40:01]
Peter Frankenbaum
Hanger, our series producers are Jane Morgan and Anoushka Lewis. Robin Scott Elliott is associate producer. Our production managers are Izzy Reid and Alex Hack Roberts. The executive producers are Tony Pastor and Jack Davenport.
- [40:15]
Afwa Hirsch
Legacy is sound engineered and designed by Alex Port Felix.
- [40:19]
Peter Frankenbaum
Music supervision is Scott Velasquez for Frit N Sink.
- [40:22]
Afwa Hirsch
Our producer for Wondery is Emanuela Quinarte Francis and our managing producer is Rachel Sibley.
- [40:28]
Peter Frankenbaum
Executive producers for Wondery are Estelle Doyle, Chris Bourne, Morgan Jones and Marshall Louis.