[K8A]∎ Libro Madame Du Barry The Wages of Beauty Tauris Parke Paperbacks Joan Haslip Books

Madame Du Barry The Wages of Beauty Tauris Parke Paperbacks Joan Haslip Books

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Madame Du Barry The Wages of Beauty Tauris Parke Paperbacks Joan Haslip Books

I have seen many films where Madame Du Barry is one of the characters, most of which are Marie Antoinette stories. The only film that I've ever seen where Madame Du Barry herself was the title character is a 1919 in German film by Ernst Lubitsch, starring Pola Negri. This film is what made me extremely curious: who was Madame Du Barry, really? I sensed that all film portrayals of her could not truly resemble the historical person, since they were a mockery and continue to be cartoons and caricatures of a historical character that dehumanize her and portray her as someone who did not really resemble her. I think that is a pity.

This biography by Joan Haslip is a must-read for all those interested in this kind of thing.

It turns out that Jeanne was neither loud nor vulgar, as she is often portrayed in film. Furthermore, she had a library and loved to collect books. She was soft-spoken, and was convent-educated in childhood which gave her fine manners. Her beauty appears to have been extraordinary. The Madame Du Barrys of the silver screen do not even resemble her physically.

What was most interesting to me was her character. She appears to have been very generous, loyal, and forgiving a friend. She was often taken advantage of by people she believed to be her friends; she would do them great favors only to be discarded later. This was a recurring theme in the biography.Yes, she lived off of her beauty and loved luxury, but so did everyone at Court. She was very much a product of her time like most human beings. I was very impressed to learn about what she was actually like, because she was so different from what popular culture has made her out to be. I wish a modern film was made in the spirit of the Lubitsch film of 1919 that sought to tell her story from a more realistic and fair perspective.


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Madame Du Barry The Wages of Beauty Tauris Parke Paperbacks Joan Haslip Books Reviews

Gives you the truth about this remarkable woman. My only prior knowledge was from the movies which make her out to be nothing but a villain .
Wonderful and sad. She was a good person.
This is a sympathetic biography of a lady whom history has not always treated kindly. Jeanne Becu du Barry rose from very humble beginnings to become the mistress of Louis XV and thus, for a time, one of the most powerful women in France. I found her story fascinating and I loved the depiction of life in the court at Versailles. I felt, however, that the author was presenting only one side of the personality of her subject. I found it hard to imagine this sweet, gentle lady introducing the worldly Louis XV to "pleasures entirely new to him." Discretion may be a virtue, and I certainly don't want an x-rated biography, but there must be a way to present the full spectrum of this woman's personality without violating good taste. I thought the author avoided the unpleasant in other areas as well. The details of Madame du Barry's trial during the Reign of Terror and the alleged charges brought against her are never made clear and her execution is reported quite briefly. But regardless of what is missing from the book, what is there is a very absorbing biography of an important woman in an elegant setting at a pivotal time in history. Anyone interested in that era should certainly read it.
Excellent book. Chock full of information on a fascinating woman living during one of the most fascinating times in French history. Ms. Haslip has researched her subject thoroughly and given a face to a women who was vilified during her time and still continues to be in our own time. My only complaint, which a fellow reviewer has already touched upon is the racist and insensitive description of Du Barry's servant Zamor. Clearly this is Ms. Haslips personal opinion showing itself. I was disgusted at her description of this individual and put off by her inability to humanize him. Regardless of what transpired between Zamora and Du Barry, he did not deserve to be depicted in this way. Apart from this error in judgement, an excellent book to be read by those who love French and 18th century history.
After reading the incredibly informative and beautifully-written biography "Marie Antoinette The Journey" by Antonia Fraser, I immediately became ravenous for information on other colorful characters mentioned in the book. The infamous Comtesse du Barry was certainly one of them! How can one not be fascinated by the tale of this beautiful, sexy, vivacious woman who rose from the lower classes through the rank of aristocratic courtesan, taking the world by storm as the King's maitresse-en-titre and then ending her days imprisoned and eventually beheaded for treason??

Shopping online, "Madame du Barry" by Joan Haslip stuck me as being the best English-language option, and I was not disappointed. The used copy that I bought was a gorgeous, slim hardback copy, long enough to know that I would get plenty of information but not so long as to be daunting.

Ms. Haslip begins the tale as I love biographies to really begin by devoting several paragraphs to describing Jeanne Becu's (Madame du Barry's birth name) immediate ancestors and their place in life. It gave a great flavor to the type of life Jeanne Becu could have expected if she chose the path presented to her.

What I enjoyed most about the book was Ms. Haslip's writing style. I did not enjoy it as much as Antonia Fraser or Alison Weir (my personal two fave biographers of European history), but her writing was straightforward, clean, intelligent and personable.

That being said, there are few things that I thought could have been improved. Again, I guess I'm just used to the formatting and pacing of Ms. Fraser and Ms. Weir, but there is a great deal of detail here, which is a good thing, but this detail was sometimes presented in dry, looong paragraphs. Chapters are very lengthy and are simply numbered with no subtitle or heading to give you a hint on what was going to transpire next in the du Barry's rollercoaster life. There are black-and-white pictures in the book, but they are very few, suprisingly few. The rich and decadent setting leaves such an open possibility of pictures, but they are strangely lacking. For example, Ms. Haslip did not include one of Marie Antoinette, who for 4 years was basically the Comtesse's main rival. It would have been nice to see paintings of more of the aristocratic characters that peppered the Comtesse's world, as well as photos of more of Versailles and - I know I'm going to butcher this word - Louveciennes, her later home. Sorry for the spelling there!

These issues are minor for me, but there is one MAJOR issue I have with Ms. Haslip's writing. She is incredibly assumptive and damning regarding the Comtesse's young "blackamoor" servant, the African or Indian young man, Zamor. Her writing in this regard completely offended me and distracted me from the book. A gift to the Comtesse - by the King, I believe - Ms. Haslip basically writes that Zamor was a cute and happy child as a young boy and always smartly dressed and doted upon by his mistress. According to the author, as he hit adolescence he became "despicable", untrustworthy, angry and, get this, "ugly."

It is one thing for Madame du Barry, a European woman of her time, to have these feelings. But these descriptions are not the Comtesse's, they are Haslip's. For Haslip, an "enlightened" 20th-century intellectual and author, this is alarming to me. She makes no effort to do what open-minded, good biographers do present different possibilies and keep an open mind. Ms. Haslip does NOT know what Zamor may have been feeling or experiencing, but she condemns him to being a terrible person. To her there is no other possibility. Yes, he very well may have been angry. After all, he was coming into manhood in an all-white, very racist 18th-century Europe. He was surrounded by luxury and career opportunity, yet could have none of it, largely because of his color. It was likely that he was the only person of color that he knew. This could have been a powder keg of emotion, frustration and hopelessness for Zamor. Also, it is possible that the Comtesse was mistreating Zamor. Times were different then. Things were acceptable in the 18th century that are unacceptable and ILLEGAL today. Yet, to the author, Zamor is simply described as an unquestionably terrible and horrible person...and this with NO reliable evidence.

I'm sorry, but in that regard, Ms. Haslip should be ashamed. She is either incredibly short-sighted...or worse.

As I have no proof that she is anything but short-sighted, I have to recommend this book. The tale of the Comtesse du Barry is absolutely fascinating, and Ms. Haslip does a solid job in telling her dramatic story.
I have seen many films where Madame Du Barry is one of the characters, most of which are Marie Antoinette stories. The only film that I've ever seen where Madame Du Barry herself was the title character is a 1919 in German film by Ernst Lubitsch, starring Pola Negri. This film is what made me extremely curious who was Madame Du Barry, really? I sensed that all film portrayals of her could not truly resemble the historical person, since they were a mockery and continue to be cartoons and caricatures of a historical character that dehumanize her and portray her as someone who did not really resemble her. I think that is a pity.

This biography by Joan Haslip is a must-read for all those interested in this kind of thing.

It turns out that Jeanne was neither loud nor vulgar, as she is often portrayed in film. Furthermore, she had a library and loved to collect books. She was soft-spoken, and was convent-educated in childhood which gave her fine manners. Her beauty appears to have been extraordinary. The Madame Du Barrys of the silver screen do not even resemble her physically.

What was most interesting to me was her character. She appears to have been very generous, loyal, and forgiving a friend. She was often taken advantage of by people she believed to be her friends; she would do them great favors only to be discarded later. This was a recurring theme in the biography.Yes, she lived off of her beauty and loved luxury, but so did everyone at Court. She was very much a product of her time like most human beings. I was very impressed to learn about what she was actually like, because she was so different from what popular culture has made her out to be. I wish a modern film was made in the spirit of the Lubitsch film of 1919 that sought to tell her story from a more realistic and fair perspective.