A few weeks ago I blogged on the birthday of a “bad girl of history,” Pauline Bonaparte. Today is the birthday of another one! Ninon de Lenclos, who was born November 10, 1620. Ninon was a writer, courtesan, and patron of the arts in Louis XIV’s France. When she died at the age of 85, Saint-Simon wrote of her, “A shining example of the triumph of vice, when directed with intelligence and redeemed by a little virtue.”
She was born Anne de Lenclos in Paris, “Ninon” was her childhood nickname. In 1632 her father was exiled from France for dueling, and when her mother died a few years later Ninon entered a convent. This didn’t last very long. She was determined to remain unmarried, but also to devote her life to pleasure of all kinds–not a life suited to a convent! On her return to Paris, she quickly became very popular in the salons, and soon opened her own, which was a center of the literary arts. Moliere was her protege, and on her death she left money for the 9-year-old son of her accountant to buy books–he would later be known as Voltaire.
She also took up the life of a courtesan, with a succession of rich and noble lovers, including the King’s own cousin Gaston de Coligny, and the duc de la Rochefoucauld. Saint-Simon wrote, “Ninon always had crowds of adorers but never more than one lover at a time, and when she tired of the present occupier she said so frankly and took another. Yet such was the authority of this wanton, that no man dared fall out with his successful rival; he was only too happy to be allowed to visit as a familiar friend.” Her profession and her outspoken opinions against organized religion caused her to be imprisoned at the Madelonnettes Convent in 1656 at the instigation of Anne of Austria, Queen Regent for her son Louis XIV. (When he grew up, of course, this sort of life was much more accepted!). She was soon visited by Queen Christina of Sweden (then abdicated and traveling around Europe), who wrote to Cardinal Mazarin and arranged Ninon’s release. (At one point in her life, Cardinal Richelieu offered her 50,000 crowns for one night in her bed. She took the money, but sent a friend instead. Just one of the many anecdotes of her eventful career…)
In 1659, Ninon wrote La coquette vengee, defending the possibility of living a good life in the absence of religion. She became friends with Racine, and also with Francoise d’Aubigne (later known as Madame de Maintenon, secret wife of Louis XIV). She went on writing and hosting her salons until her death in 1705, a very wealthy and famous woman.
There aren’t a lot of sources on her life in English, though she appears in many bios of other figures of the period. I have an old volume in translation by Antoine Bret, The Biography of Ninon de Lenclos, and there is one in French by Rogier Duchene. And there is a Dorothy Parker poem, Ninon de Lenclos On Her Last Birthday.
I guess Ninon could be the heroine of one of the popular “courtesan” romances, except she never settled down! 🙂 Do you like courtesan heroines?
And I almost forgot! I have a UK release this month, To Kiss a Count (the third in my Muses of Mayfair trilogy! These will be out in the US in April, May, and June 2010…)
I’ll also be at a 6-author booksigning at a Borders in Albuquerque on Saturday the 14th–if you’re in the area come by and say hi!
When Amanda and I went to New York for Book Expo, we also were invited to Harlequin’s Art Exhibit, honoring 60 years of Harlequin cover art. Later at the RWA conference, Harlequin announced that there would be office products featuring these covers for sale in the big bookstores. Harlequin would also re-release copies of these old paperbacks.
Those vintage products are here!
There are several to choose from, all featuring different vintage covers, including Spiral Notebooks, Tins of Postcards, Address Books, Matchbook Notepads, Composition Books
And, of course, the vintage books themselves, printed to look just like they did when first published.
You can find them all on eHarlequin. And while you are there, you might want to order Gallant Officer, Forbidden Lady. It will be in bookstores Dec 1, but you can get it now at eHarlequin. Gallant Officer, Forbidden Lady is a featured book. Buy $15 of these featured books and you get $20 worth of books!
I’m in love with these vintage products! I’m certainly going to order some. They match the totebag Harlequin gave out at RWA, too!
Do you like nostalgic things? What item or items would you want, if you could have any vintage or antique item in the world?
Today, the Riskies welcome Anthea Lawson! And answer the question below to be entered to win a copy of Passionate.
Anthea Lawson is the pseudonym of a husband-wife writing team whose romances are set in early Victorian England, with a touch of travel to exotic locales. Their second novel, ALL HE DESIRES, has just been released. Their debut novel, PASSIONATE, was nominated for a Best First Book RITA in 2009. Visit their website, http://www.anthealawson.com for all their latest news!
About ALL HE DESIRES:
Far from home and her noble relatives, Miss Caroline Huntington has been injured in a fall from her horse. Called to her side, Alex Trentham knows he must assist her, though he has not practiced as a physician for a long while. Just to see so lovely a woman in a state of undress is a hard test of his self-control. Caroline is all that is warm and feminine, beautiful and pure.
Brave to a fault, she does not flinch under his hands, and soon she is on the mend. Alex struggles to hide his feelings, knowing that his dark past shadows any hope of a future. But Caroline’s radiant innocence is dangerous to a worldly man, and she seems achingly eager to experience all the pleasure he could show her…
“I find this to be a wonderful example of historical romance. Ms. Lawson tells a powerful love story and draws the reader in within the first chapter. This tale comes with a high recommendation from this reviewer.” – Coffee Time Romance
“This husband-and-wife team’s second novel sweeps from the shores of Crete to the streets of London… readers will enjoy the characters and the beautiful descriptions in this nice tale.” –Romantic Times
Please welcome Anthea Lawson:
Q. You two are a couple, AND you write together. What the hell? Are you trying to make all us squabbling married couples look bad? And how do you do it?
Writing together is not squabble-fee, but we’re used to creative collaboration from many years playing in a band, producing CDs and doing other other fun, creative projects together. Each of us brings very different strengths to the process, and we’ve learned to respect our unique talents. When we disagree over something while writing, that is just a signal to search for something better that pleases both of us.
Q. How did you think of writing this particular book? Did it start as a character, a setting, or some other element?
Anthea had the first sentence in her head months before we began writing — “Caroline Huntington was falling.” We also knew we wanted to set the first part of the book on the Isle of Crete. Also, we wanted a moody and dark hero with a haunted past. Things just unfolded from there.
Q. What fascinates you most about the early Victorian period?
The English were all over the globe, invincible in their sense of Empire. Add the burgeoning industrial revolution, the everyman scientist, and you have rich ground to plant all kinds of stories.
Q. How long did it take? Was this an easy or difficult book to write?
We had a little over a year to write this book. Being under a contract deadline was totally different from being able to work at our leisure, like we did with our first novel. ALL HE DESIRES was more stressful to write because of that, plus we were working on deepening the the emotions in our writing. There was (and is) so much left to learn about writing great romances. Our editor left the publishing house partway through, and that also made things a little more complicated.
Q. Tell me more about your characters. What or who inspired them?
Our heroine appears briefly in our first book, PASSIONATE — she’s the sister of that book’s hero. She was an interesting, spunky character, and we had a hunch we’d want to write about her. After that, we spent time figuring out a hero that would be an impossible and stubborn match for her. 🙂
Q. Did you run across anything new and unusual while researching this book?
We got to find out more about erotic Roman frescoes! That was fun. (We posted on this the other day at the Naughty & Spice blog for those interested in reading more.) We also got to immerse ourselves in the history and culture of Crete — though only in a virtual sense. One of our dreams is to be able to travel for extended periods to the exotic places we like to write about.
Q. What do you think is the greatest creative risk you’ve taken in this book? How do you feel about it?
We really wanted to increase the emotional intensity of the story and explore some deeper emotions. We gave our hero a tortured past that he refuses to talk about. His story is slowly revealed to both the reader and the Heroine. Moving him emotionally to a place where he could love freely felt risky. There was definitely some worry that the event that triggered his self-exile from England would be a problem for readers, but so far it seems to not be an issue.
Q. Is there anything you wanted to include in the book that you (or your CPs or editor) felt was too controversial and left out?
One of the best things about working with our publisher was the freedom we had to write the story we wanted. Since we work as a team, the book really has a lot of editing complete before we turn it in. The things we thought might be controversial we left in.
Q. What are you working on next?
We’re working on a series set against the glittering backdrop of 19th century musical celebrity. We’ve been professional musicians for many years, and its so much fun to capture the excitement of performing and make it part of the story. Music is a language of emotion and there is a lot that goes on backstage. We are about half-way through the first novel and we think readers will love this story. The romance is really working.
Q. Is there anything else you would like readers to know about you or your books?
Our first novel, PASSIONATE, was nominated for a 2009 RITA Best First Book. It’s not in most stores now (most romances have only a couple of months on store shelves) but it is available through Amazon, Powell’s, Borders, and other on-line retailers. If you like All He Desires, we would encourage you to give the first novel a read, too!
In fact, to help facilitate that, we’ll be giving away a copy of PASSIONATE to one lucky commenter. So tell us, what kind of risks do you think work – or don’t work – in historical romance?
The DVD for the 1981 version of Sense & Sensibility has been sitting on my dresser since January, when my husband had his stroke. Once in a while, I’d notice it and think about sending it back to Netflix and lowering our service to 1 DVD a month, but I kept hoping to get a chance to watch it.
Anyway, last week I finally got my chance. My younger daughter decided to reuse the Felicity (American girl) costume I’d made for her older sister a few years ago, which was nice. But the older one wanted to stay in theme and go as Abigail Adams. See, Megan has the cool kid, while mine are nerdy, though in a cool way, I think. 🙂
Hoping to save time, I bought an old prom dress at Salvation Army, telling myself that changing the sleeves and shortening the hem would be easier than sewing a new gown. Ha! Not only did I have to make new sleeves, I had to redo the bodice and since I wanted to preserve the ruffle at the hem, I had to detach the bodice from the skirt, etc… Well, you get the picture. I was up late sewing for a few nights before Halloween and decided the S&S DVD would help me stay awake.
I’m pretty much an Austen adaptation ho—there are few versions I don’t like. Unfortunately this is one of the few.
The script was clunky, IMHO, showing little of Jane’s wit or liveliness. There were scenes with minor characters that seemed thrown in for no obvious reason (I don’t remember if they were in the book). The pacing was slow, except for the rushed ending in which we were gypped of seeing the resolution of Marianne and Colonel Brandon’s romance.
To my mind, the worst problem was with the characterization of the two sisters. The differences between the two sisters were exaggerated to the point that they became one-dimensional: Elinor coldly robotic, Marianne spoiled rotten. When Marianne gets overly dramatic about her feelings on leaving Norland, Elinor is almost cruel in dismissing the real emotions underlying her sister’s dramatics. I really couldn’t care much about either of them.
It seems to me that some of the Austen adaptations of this period, though they seem to be attempting to be painstakingly accurate, are so busy hallowing Jane that they miss out on wit and vitality of her work and characters. They seem to carefully eschew anything that might look like sexual attraction. Some subtle sexual tension would be very much in the spirit of the books, IMHO. I think some of the more recent adaptations work better, even if they don’t follow the books as slavishly.
One thing I did like about this version is the simple look of the interiors and the clothing, which seemed like what the Dashwood girls could afford rather getting a glamorized Hollywood treatment.
But overall, I prefer either the Emma Thompson or last year’s BBC version to this one. I’d recommend it only if you are like me and feel compelled to see every Austen adaptation out there.
So has anyone else seen this version? What did you think? What approach to Austen film adaptations do you like best?
Elena
www.elenagreene.com