9781596910577

The first major biography of one of France's most mysterious women--Marie Antoinette's only child to survive the revolution. Susan Nagel, author of the critically acclaimed biographyMistress of the Elgin Marbles, turns her attention to the life of a remarkable woman who both defined and shaped an era, the tumultuous last days of the crumblingancien régime. Nagel brings the formidable Marie-Thérèse to life, along with the age of revolution and the waning days of the aristocracy, in a page-turning biography that will appeal to fans of Antonia Fraser'sMarie Antoinetteand Amanda Foreman'sGeorgiana: Duchess of Devonshire. In December 1795, at midnight on her seventeenth birthday, Marie-Thérèse, the only surviving child of Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI, escaped from Paris's notorious Temple Prison. To this day many believe that the real Marie-Thérèse, traumatized following her family's brutal execution during the Reign of Terror, switched identities with an illegitimate half sister who was often mistaken for her twin. Was the real Marie-Thérèse spirited away to a remote castle to live her life as the woman called "the Dark Countess," while an imposter played her role on the political stage of Europe? Now, two hundred years later, using handwriting samples, DNA testing, and an undiscovered cache of Bourbon family letters, Nagel finally solves this mystery. She tells the remarkable story in full and draws a vivid portrait of an astonishing woman who both defined and shaped an era. Marie-Thérèse's deliberate choice of husbands determined the map of nineteenth-century Europe. Even Napoleon was in awe and called her "the only man in the family." Nagel's gripping narrative captures the events of her fascinating life from her very public birth in front of the rowdy crowds and her precocious childhood to her hideous time in prison and her later reincarnation in the public eye as a saint, and, above all, her fierce loyalty to France throughout.

Susan Nagel is the bestselling author of Mistress of the Elgin Marbles and a critically acclaimed book on the novels of Jean Giraudoux. She has written for the stage, screen, scholarly journals, and Town and Country. She is a professor in the humanities department at Marymount Manhattan College and lives in New York City.

List of Illustrations
Chronology
Family Trees
Map
Sinner
Sex and Politics	p. 3
Child of France	p. 20
Playmates	p. 33
Once upon a Time	p. 43
Storm Clouds over the Palace	p. 53
The End of the Fairy Tale	p. 70
A New Home	p. 83
A Dangerous Game	p. 100
The Losing Side	p. 111
Two Orphans	p. 123
Sole Survivor	p. 145
Saint
Every Inch a Princess	p. 163
Vienna	p. 176
The Emigres	p. 186
The Birth of a Strategist	p. 198
A Bride	p. 207
The New Antigone	p. 218
Country Life	p. 236
The Only Man in the Family	p. 250
Restoration	p. 270
Birth, Death and a New Dauphine	p. 284
Mending Fences	p. 299
Suspicions Confirmed	p. 318
Blackmail	p. 332
Queen of France	p. 349
The Matriarch	p. 357
Afterword	p. 367
Notes	p. 377
Bibliography	p. 383
Index	p. 393
Table of Contents provided by Blackwell. All Rights Reserved.

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Marie-Therese, Child of Terror The Fate of Marie Antoinette's Daughter

1596910577

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