I can't believe it's already been six days since I crossed the threshold of Versailles. We had to take a special train linked to the métro to get there. I was expecting the palace to be in the middle of the country as it was 220 years ago, but to my surprise Paris has long since overflowed its Revolution-era boundaries and stretched out to the Sun King's realm.
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| The glory of Versailles. |
The palace itself is ridiculous. The entire exterior is covered in carvings and statues, and most of the front facade (the home of the king himself) is lined with gold that reflects the rising sun. It is extensive--a three-floor monstrosity with three wings. For how large the palace is, it is almost shocking how little is open to the public. I saw the chapel, a small succession of rooms dedicated to royal history, the king's apartment, the Hall of Mirrors, the queen's chambers, the converted-museum portion, and the dauphin's (prince's) apartments--probably less than 7 percent of the palace's interior. The rooms of the courtiers and the servant quarters were completely left out, as were the private (and infinitely more interesting) chambers of the king and queen. Little information was available about the day-to-day lives of the inhabitants of Versailles, which frustrated me as those little day-to-day details are what I find most fascinating.
Le Grand Trianon and le Petit Trianon, the more secluded residences of the royal family, felt more accessible in that they actually seemed livable, but the French public/private space mania remained apparent. For the French, members of a state that is almost completely centralized, the separation of private and public space is essential. People must protect the small portion of their lives that belongs solely to them. For instance, when an American invites a guest to her home, she welcomes the guest like family, giving her a tour of the house (maybe even of the bedrooms) and inviting her to "help yourself" and "make yourself at home." When a French person invites someone to her home, she allows the guest to enter only the rooms that are necessary: the foyer, the living room, the dining room, and little else. The home is a private space, one to be guarded from the public. As a king, Louis XIV recognized the necessity of his private life to be on public display; he lived for his people. For this reason the courtiers were allowed to attend the "levé" (rising) and "couché" (going to bed) ceremonies of the king and queen. Being allowed to attend such ceremonies was a matter of personal pride, and the courtiers would vie for the right to enter the royal apartment to see the king roll out of bed and powder his face. An actual gate separates the king's bed from the rest of the room to keep overexcited courtiers at bay.
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| Barrier to keep out the king's overenthusiastic groupies. |
In contrast, le Grand Trianon (residence of the kings' mistresses and later Napoleon and King Louis-Philippe) and le Petit Trianon (private mansion of Marie Antoinette) are structured for more private living. By the sheer structure of the buildings we were allowed to see a greater portion of the residences. I even got to see Marie Antoinette's toilet.
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| Marie Antoinette's throne. |
My favorite by far was le hameau (hamlet) of Marie Antoinette, built for her by her husband (or rather on his bill and by his orders) in 1783. Beautiful in its simplicity, her hameau is a true paradise, and also a clear indicator of why the French Revolution went down. As a working village, the hameau romanticizes the hardships of peasant life, and, adding insult to injury, is an extravagance paid for on the peasants' dime. For me, however, romantic thinker that I am, the hameau represents Marie Antoinette herself. A simple, beautiful young woman who did not want to be queen but instead dreamed of being a humble peasant girl, she was forced to live her daily life under the cruelly scrutinizing eye of the French court as la Reine de la France. Her hameau was her escape from this harsh spotlight, a place where she could imagine a life different from the one for which she was fated. Victim of the anger of an unjustly ruled people, she met her tragic end at the Place de la Concorde in 1793. Thousands of Parisians cheered as the guillotine blade sliced through the air and the executioner lifted her bloody head above the crowd. As the sun set on her peaceful paradise, emphasizing the crumbling walls, the rusted gates, the unusable staircase, the barren earth of January, I felt Marie Antoinette in her garden. I could see her swimming in the pond and laughing in her gaiety. It was truly haunting, and I have decided to return to Versailles this week for the sole purpose of returning to her hameau (plus I've chosen the hameau as the topic of my research project for the Paris class).
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| At the hameau. |
Other high points on the Paris menu:
-Centre Pomidou: modern art museum. The first exhibit we came to was an entire floor dedicated to feminist art. Score! I was enraptured (and a tad disturbed) for a good two hours. Fabulous. I was then too mentally and emotionally exhausted to enjoy the more famous pieces on the next floor (Matisse, Picasso, and all that jazz), but it was worth the sacrifice.
-Musée Carnavalet: museum about the history of Paris. Not quite as fascinating as I was hoping, but I saw some really cool Parisian artwork and explored a beautiful building.
-Hot times at the French cinéma. Saw one movie (Love et autres drogues, in English) on the Champs-Elysées and another (Le Fils à Jo~ The Son of Jo, en français) at a cinéma near our hotel.
-Hôtel des Invalides: French war museum and old armory. I was amused by the size of Napoleon's tomb, enthralled by the wealth of information in the exhibits on the First and Second World Wars, and amused again by the treasury of medieval armor.
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| Me with my knight in shining armor. |
I've also figured out how to find great food in Paris for cheap. Oui!
I'm feeling really high on life right now, and I'm so glad to be here in France with so many wonderful people.
Five days until Rennes.
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