Book 34: Madame Tussaud: A Novel of the French Revolutionby Michelle Moran
Description: The world knows Madame Tussaud as a wax artist extraordinaire . . . but who was this woman who became one of the most famous sculptresses of all time? In these pages, her tumultuous and amazing story comes to life as only Michelle Moran can tell it. The year is 1788, and a revolution is about to begin.
Smart and ambitious, Marie Tussaud has learned the secrets of wax sculpting by working alongside her uncle in their celebrated wax museum, the Salon de Cire. From her popular model of the American ambassador, Thomas Jefferson, to her tableau of the royal family at dinner, Marie’s museum provides Parisians with the very latest news on fashion, gossip, and even politics. Her customers hail from every walk of life, yet her greatest dream is to attract the attention of Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI; their stamp of approval on her work could catapult her and her museum to the fame and riches she desires. After months of anticipation, Marie learns that the royal family is willing to come and see their likenesses. When they finally arrive, the king’s sister is so impressed that she requests Marie’s presence at Versailles as a royal tutor in wax sculpting. It is a request Marie knows she cannot refuse—even if it means time away from her beloved Salon and her increasingly dear friend, Henri Charles.
As Marie gets to know her pupil, Princesse Élisabeth, she also becomes acquainted with the king and queen, who introduce her to the glamorous life at court. From lavish parties with more delicacies than she’s ever seen to rooms filled with candles lit only once before being discarded, Marie steps into a world entirely different from her home on the Boulevard du Temple, where people are selling their teeth in order to put food on the table.
Meanwhile, many resent the vast separation between rich and poor. In salons and cafés across Paris, people like Camille Desmoulins, Jean-Paul Marat, and Maximilien Robespierre are lashing out against the monarchy. Soon, there’s whispered talk of revolution. . . . Will Marie be able to hold on to both the love of her life and her friendship with the royal family as France approaches civil war? And more important, will she be able to fulfill the demands of powerful revolutionaries who ask that she make the death masks of beheaded aristocrats, some of whom she knows?
Spanning five years, from the budding revolution to the Reign of Terror, Madame Tussaud brings us into the world of an incredible heroine whose talent for wax modeling saved her life and preserved the faces of a vanished kingdom. [GoodReads]
Let me tell you a little bit about the strangeness of how I came across this book:
For the record, I am an odd creature. When an idea enters my mind, I often attack it with the ferocity of a scruffy beast finding his lunch in a dark alley. Whether good or bad, my mind completely breathes life into it to the point of where I break a sweat. More times than not, I drop the idea within the next two minutes due to boredom; but sometimes, the unthinkable happens and I actually commit to something.
I went to a friend's baby shower at the end of June. Now, this girl has money. She comes from money, she makes money, she breathes money - she's got it all! Going in, I knew this would be nothing short of the most rocking party for an unborn baby as a party could get. I drive up to the venue, park my car, and look over to see a dingy pair of railroad tracks cutting through the road. I stumble further down the lane (I don't recommend wearing four inch heels to a baby shower.) and it isn't until then that I am welcomed by a beautiful grotto tucked within some trees. When I finally enter the building and follow the elevator up to the floor of the party, I am blown away by the gorgeousness of this celebration. The wine is flowing, hors d'oeuvres are served on silver platters, and gifts spill into the initial seating area. But it isn't any of this that surprises me. So what is?
...It's the very
elegant Paris-themed dining room that transports me from June 2013 to Henry XVI's court at Versailles (though I won't be able to even distinguish this as an actual place and time until I read Moran's novel, of course)! Everything, from the table decorations (I sit at the Eiffel Tower table with the mommy-to-be) to the favors (authentic soap imported from France) to the centerpieces (photos of all the male children in the family wearing the most adorable fake moustaches you ever did see!) to food (lobster lasagna!), is as real as any American can get to what a French party might look like. Even the desserts drip with French-ness! While I'm a traveler and crave learning about new cultures almost as much as I love to read, I've never once in my life felt so entranced by the French.
Days after leaving this shower, I decided to enroll myself in French classes (which, FORTUNATELY, did not happen because I very recently became employed with District 205 as a Strategic Literacy teacher!) and teach myself the culture, where upon asking for some reading suggestions, my go-to reader friend Shelly told me of Moran's masterpiece.
I suppose what drew me to this novel moreso than the very accurate account of the French Revolution was the novel's protagonist, Madame Marie Tussaud, the very artist who was able to make history come alive through her wax sculptures
(Madame Tussaud's Attractions). Here are a couple of photos I took while visiting the Las Vegas location.
 |
| Hugh Hefner |
 |
| Jack Sparrow |
 |
| Stevie Wonder |
 |
| The King |
Needless to say, Madame Tussaud is a fantastic story about the fall of the royal court at Versailles and how the lives of millions were altered during the French Revolution. It is also the first novel I've ever read relating to France and its past, so I intend to keep it tucked away in the bosom of my heart forever.
Meet the Author: Michelle Moran was born in southern California. After attending Pomona College, she earned a Masters Degree from the Claremont Graduate University. During her six years as a public high school teacher, Michelle used her summers to travel around the world, and it was her experiences as a volunteer on archaeological digs that inspired her to write historical fiction. She is the international bestselling author of Nefertiti, The Heretic Queen, Cleopatra's Daughter, Madame Tussaud, and The Second Empress. Her novels have been translated into more than twenty languages, and in 2011, her fourth book, Madame Tussaud, was optioned by Gaumont to be turned into a mini-series. Recently, Michelle was married in India, and it is no coincidence that her next two books will be set in the East! [GoodReads]
To visit Michelle, follow these links:
Michelle Moran SITE
Facebook
Here's a Q&A with Michelle Moran on
Madame Tussaud that I found on her website (MichelleMoran.com):
Q: What drew you to the story of Marie Tussaud?
A: My interest in Marie Tussaud began on my very first trip to London. Like thousands of tourists before me, I had decided that I wanted to visit the famous wax museum,
Madame Tussauds. At the time, I knew almost nothing about the woman behind the name, but as I passed through the exhibition, I began to piece together what would ultimately prove to be a fascinating story. In the first wax tableau I came across, Marie Tussaud had modeled Queen Marie Antoinette with her husband and children. They looked young and happy, dressed in lavish court gowns and silk
culottes. In another tableau, the mistress of King Louis XV lay sprawled on a couch, her blonde hair tumbling down her shoulders. Clearly, Marie Tussaud had been interested in modeling the celebrities of her day. Some she would have sculpted from memory, while many she would have met and modeled in person. Marie’s art had obviously gained her access to some of the highest circles in French society.
But in a third tableau, a different part of Marie Tussaud’s life emerged. Dressed in a black gown and dirtied apron, a young Marie could be seen holding up a lantern in the Madeleine Cemetery. The Revolution had begun, and she was searching through a pile of severed heads – all victims of Madame Guillotine. Immediately, I wanted to know what was she doing in that cemetery. Whose heads were they, and did she know those people? When I learned what Marie Tussaud went through during the French Revolution – who she’d met, where she’d gone, and what she’d seen – I knew I would someday tell her story.
Q: Why does history tend to remember the French Revolution as being successful?
A: Probably because it did exactly what its leaders intended, which was to deal a devastating blow to the aristocracy. But very soon after the overthrow of the monarchy, France’s new government became obsessed with idea of rooting out Royalists. A fever like that of the Salem Witch Trials gripped France, and neighbor began turning on neighbor, accusing each other of being royalists. And it didn’t take much to be sentenced to the guillotine. By 1793, all a person had to do was whistle the wrong tune or disrespect a liberty tree (saplings planted in the name of “liberty”) to be accused of endangering the nation. By the end of the French Revolution, more than five hundred thousand French citizens had been killed, most of them commoners.
Q: How did you go about researching Madame Tussaud?
A: I began with a trip to France, where nearly all of the novel takes place. Once there, I tried to visit the locations Madame Tussaud herself would have seen. Some—such as the Bastille—no longer exist, but there are others—Versailles being the sublime example—where a great deal of 18th century life has been preserved. After my trip, I did as much research as I could in libraries. Finally, anything I couldn’t find in books I tried to discover through email conversations with some very generous French historians.
Q: What is the most interesting fact you learned while researching Madame Tussaud?
A: That in 18th century France, most people went to street dentists when they had a toothache. These dentists would sit at a table laid out with various tools, and their unfortunate patients would have their teeth extracted right there, in the dirty street. After the extraction, the patient could sell his tooth (or teeth, if he was unlucky) to the dentist, who would then sell it to people like Marie Tussaud for her wax models. I know… creepy and disturbing!
Q: In your research about Marie Antoinette, did you come away feeling sorry for Queen Marie Antoinette? A: Yes. I think the queen was as much a victim of circumstance as she was her own naiveté. While it’s true that she held lavish balls in Versailles and spent a fortune on gowns, this really wasn’t anything new for the monarchy. The difference was that it was Marie Antoinette, and not the king, who was doing the spending. The resentment and jealousy which built up around the queen having access to her husband’s money earned her some powerful enemies at court. Meanwhile, the commoners were growing resentful as well. Yet the entire royal family’s expenditures were actually a small fraction of the nation’s budget, and whenever Marie Antoinette tried to economize, the courtiers who counted on her favors would raise a hue and cry. Various nobles had grown accustomed to the extra money they could earn from selling the dresses she had already worn or the accessories which had been ordered for her (often far more than she actually needed or used). These privileges were jealously guarded in Versailles, and this meant that the queen was “damned if she did, and damned if she didn’t.”
Q: Why are we still interested in Madame Tussaud 250 years after her birth?
A: I think the fascination with Madame Tussaud comes from the fact that the life she created was as intricate and mystifying as her artistry itself. Here was a woman who was asked to tutor the king’s sister, yet she managed to keep her head during the Reign of Terror when women were being imprisoned for nothing more than wearing the wrong color. She navigated two very different worlds – the court of Versailles and the streets of Paris - and against all odds, lived to tell the tale. And through it all, it was her artistry that saved her. Today, with digital cameras available to capture everything around us, you would think it would be difficult to become enthusiastic about seeing a person’s likeness reproduced in wax. But there is something compelling about waxworks, particularly those done at the various
Madame Tussauds around the world. Perhaps it’s the thrill of pretending to photograph yourself next to a celebrity, or getting to pose with Henry VIII “in the flesh,” that keep customers coming back. Or maybe it’s the eerie and arresting vision of a lifeless object that so closely mimics someone’s humanity that people relate to. Whatever it is, I think
Madame Tussauds will be a major draw even in another two hundred and fifty years.
Q: If Madame Tussaud were alive today, would she be happy to see that her wax museums have expanded not only throughout Europe, but now the world?A: I think Marie Tussaud would be ecstatic. Having grown up on the Boulevard du Temple surrounded by actresses and showmen, Marie was taught from a very young age that publicity was the difference between staying in business and having to sell your teeth in order to buy bread. Today, the
Madame Tussauds wax museums do a wonderful job of finding new subjects to model, and the public unveilings of their new wax figures would have absolutely delighted Marie. A part of me wants to say, “If only Marie could see her museum now,” but something tells me she wouldn’t be surprised at all by how popular her exhibition has become.
UPCOMING BOOK:
The Second Empress: A Novel of Napoleon's Court by
Michelle Moran
> > >
[Jump to this blog!]
