Marie-Antoinette: The Making of a French Queen

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Présentation de l'éditeur
A new look which fundamentally overturns our understanding of this famously 'out of touch' queen

Who was the real Marie-Antoinette? She was mistrusted and reviled in her own time, and today she is portrayed as a lightweight incapable of understanding the events that engulfed her. In this new account, John Hardman redresses the balance and sheds fresh light on Marie-Antoinette's story.

Hardman shows how Marie-Antoinette played a significant but misunderstood role in the crisis of the monarchy. Drawing on new sources, he describes how, from the outset, Marie-Antoinette refused to prioritize the aggressive foreign policy of her mother, Maria-Theresa, bravely took over the helm from Louis XVI after the collapse of his morale, and, when revolution broke out, listened to the Third Estate and worked closely with repentant radicals to give the constitutional monarchy a fighting chance. For the first time, Hardman demonstrates exactly what influence Marie-Antoinette had and when and how she exerted it.

Biographie de l'auteur
John Hardman is one of the world's leading experts on the French Revolution and the author of several well-regarded books on the subject. He was formerly lecturer in modern history at the University of Edinburgh.

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WHAT THE REVIEWERS SAY

• ... splendid ... The first half of Mr. Hardman’s masterly biography offers an account of the court and pre-Revolution politics. It is lucid but involved, and some may find it hard going. It is with the forced move to Paris that the book takes off ... is not only a wonderfully gripping biography, it is also a history of the most dramatic stage of the French Revolution.
  
  
• Hardman moves through the details of Marie Antoinette’s childhood more quickly than some of her other biographers. This is, after all, an academic look rather than a life and times ... There are a few flaws. For instance, England is used on dozens of occasions where Britain is meant, seven decades after the Act of Union. However, as a political biography of the last Bourbon queen of France it is hard to see how it could be bettered — failing a cache of previously undiscovered letters or memoirs turning up. Hardman utilises years of researching the fall of the French monarchy, weaving in accounts by those who knew, loved or loathed Marie Antoinette, to offer a broadly convincing portrait of a woman who 'inspired loyalty in strangers who were willing to risk their lives for her, even when the chances of success were slight'. It is a thought-provoking portrait of a brave, well-intentioned, if often misguided queen.
  
  
• ... dense ... Hardman’s willingness to accept the contemporary notion that Marie Antoinette’s 'frigidity' played a part in the royal couple’s early fertility problems somewhat undermines his revisionist arguments, as does his admission that the queen was 'largely unprepared' for the task of 'turn[ing] the tide of revolutionary fervour.' Academics well-versed in the French Revolution will appreciate Hardman’s diligent marshaling of the period’s many twists and turns, however.
  https://bookmarks.reviews/reviews/all/marie-antoinette-the-making-of-a-french-queen/
  

A priori assez attirant.

Marie-Antoinette: The Making of a French Queen by John Hardman tries to show us an independent and powerful Queen, much misunderstood and ready for a fresh look at her life. However, she disappears from her own book by the introduction of so many different characters small and big. I was surprised to see her miscarriage skipped over in one line and I felt really disconnected from Marie-Antoinette while reading this. I just couldn’t get into it, which I thought was a real shame as I had been really looking forward to this book.
https://www.historyofroyalwomen.com/book-reviews/marie-antoinette-the-making-of-a-french-queen-by-john-hardman-book-review/

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