1.

How important was Marie Antoinette's childhood in Austria�historical enemy of

France�in influencing her career? Would it ever have been possible for an Austrian
princess to have a satisfactory life in France?

2. Was Marie Antoinette's relationship with her mother, the Empress Maria Teresa, a
damaging or a supportive element of her life?

3. Marie Antoinette's marriage to the Dauphin, later Louis XVI, remained

unconsummated for seven and a half years. What effect did this have on her
character�and her relationship wth her husband?

4. Were the accusations of extravagance and frivolity leveled against Marie

Antoinette justified�both during her own lifetime and since? Marie Antoinette was
also the target of numerous vicious libels about her sexuality. What part did these
libels played in blackening the image of royalty in France, and how valid were
they?

5. Assess the political role of Marie Antoinette in the years shortly before the
French Revolution: Should she have tried to influence Louis XVI more or was she
correct to let history take its own course?

6. Marie Antoinette was a patron of the arts and a nature enthusiast. Is

philanthropy an essential part of the royal role?

7. Once the French Revolution started, Marie Antoinette could probably have escaped
by herself, or with her little son disguised as a girl. Instead she saw it asher
duty to remain at the King's side. Knowing that she was an unpopular queen, why did
she make that decision?

8. Marie Antoinette's courage and composure at her trial and execution aroused
widespread admiration at the time, even from her enemies. How much had her
character changed since her youth? Or were such qualities always latent in her
personality?�
Why the sudden interest in France's last memorable queen?

Marie Antoinette, air-headed Austrian princess and then much traduced French queen,
was born 250 years ago last year. The anniversary has generated aHollywood film
starring Kirsten Dunst and several exhibitions.

From today, the Archives in Paris will be showing for the first time most of the
personal and public documents related to Marie Antoinette held by the French state.
They range from her marriage certificate (as thick as a telephone directory) to her
death warrant and the last, moving and courageous letter she wrote just before she
was sent to the guillotine on 16 October 1793.

Did she really say 'let them eat cake'?

Non. Or at least probably not. Marie Antoinette is reputed to have suggested that
the starving, pre-revolutionary poor, if they were unable to afford bread, should
develop a taste for "brioche", a form of cake. There is no historical record that
she said any such thing. Her most celebrated words were almost certainly invented
by a rumour-monger or pamphleteer.

That being said, the pre-revolutionary Marie Antoinette was probably capable of
saying something just as insensitive. Her own early letters suggest an under-
educated, gossipy, plump young queen, with a taste for plumed coiffures (the "big
hair" of its era), young male friends, horse-riding, gambling and diamonds.

Why else is her reputation so lousy?

Long before the revolution began in 1789, Marie Antoinette was much detested and
lied about in the snake-pit of late 18th century France. This was partly because
she was foreign and partly because she was an independent-minded woman. She was
known - to nobility and poor people alike - as l'Autrichienne, the Austrian, but
emphasising the chienne, which means "bitch".

She failed for many years to produce an heir (through no fault of her own). She
refused to tolerate the sillier traditions and people in the court at Versailles.
She invented a parallel court at the Petit Trianon in the palace grounds where she
dressed up as a milkmaid and cared for heavily perfumed sheep and goats.
Aristocratic gossip, and the popular "gazettes" of the day, accused her of multiple
affairs with young men, and women. She was decried, both by aristocrats and the
bourgousie, as extravagant and immoral. Marie Antoinette was both - but no more so
than the rest of royal and aristocratic society.

The new exhibition at the national Archives contains several letters in which Marie
Antoinette defends herself to friends, or alleged friends, in strong, confident,
rather modern-looking handwriting.

Was she an 18th-century Princess Diana?

Evelyne Lever, the greatest French authority on Marie Antoinette, believes there
are many similarities. "Here was a young woman pushed into a loveless marriage, who
had little in common with her husband, who had loves of her own which she could not
publicly express, who wanted to live her own life, who became the centre of great
scandals and died in dramatic circumstances," Mme Lever says.

The historian believes the many parallels with Diana, Princess of Wales, partly
explain the resurgence of interest in Marie Antoinette. "The great difference is
that, in the final years, adversity brought Marie Antoinette closer to her husband.
The Revolution revealed in her depths of character and toughness which were not
apparent before," she adds.

Did the revolution change her then?

Yes and no. As the daughter of an empress and wife of a monarch, Marie Antoinette
remained convinced of the divine right of kings. In coded letters from captivity,
she describes the democratic ideal as a "tissue of absurdities". She dismisses the
revolutionaries as "monsters", "scoundrels", "madmen and "animals", egged on by
"freemasons".

The royal family clearly had difficulty adjusting to its new life, first under
house arrest and then in prison. The Archives exhibition contains the minutes of
the revolutionary tribunal of the Commune of Paris when it discusses, pompously, a
request from Marie Antoinette for a pair of nail-scissors for herself and her
children. She is refused.

All the same, this was a different Marie Antoinette from the pleasure-loving girl
of the early years of her marriage. In adversity, she became the constant friend
and ally of her rather hopeless husband, Louis XVI. It is she, not him, who worked
tirelessly post- 1789 to save the family business and all of their heads.

She plotted to organise a failed royal flight from Paris towards Austrian-
controlled territory in June 1791. Returned to captivity in Paris, she began a
long, secret correspondence with a moderate revolutionary leader to try to rescue a
kind of constitutional monarchy on the British pattern from the Jacobin radicals
who threatened to hijack the Revolution. Her letters are tough, wily and shrewd and
demonstrate a close grasp of the ever-changing minutiae of revolutionary politics.
Is there a case for Marie Antoinette as a tragic heroine?

Yes. She had several opportunities to escape alone but refused to do so without her
family. Even moderate revolutionaries with whom she conspired were astonished by
her fortitude and mental strength. She was, however, also plotting behind their
backs to persuade her brother, the Austrian emperor, to restore absolute monarchy
in France.

The king was tried and executed in January 1793. Marie Antoinette's eight-year-old
son, Louis, was taken from her and brainwashed until he accused her of sexually
abusing him. He died of illness and neglect. The exhibition contains a lock of his
hair; it also contains a transcript of his mother's trial, where she was accused of
incest. She defended herself with great dignity.

Marie Antoinette never grasped the causes of the Revolution, but it exposed in her
unsuspected depths of courage and loyalty. In her celebrated final letter to her
sister-in-law, written a few hours before her execution in what is now the Place de
la Concorde, Marie Antoinette, by then a wizened old woman of 48, wrote: "I pardon
my enemies the wrongs that they have done me... I also had friends... Let them know
that, to my last moment, I was thinking of them."

Has Marie Antoinette been wronged by history?

Yes...

* She never said 'let them eat cake'

* She was a more complex, even tragic, figure than popular memory allows

* In the most desperate circumstances she proved a loyal friend, wife and mother

No...

* She sums up the vanity, extravagance and arrogance of the 'ancien r�gime'

* She remained a die-hard, absolutist monarchist to the end

* Her air-headed early behaviour as queen gave ammunition to her enemies

1. Why is Marie Antoinette's mother so interested in seeing that her daughter
becomes the Queen of France?
2. If you, too, lived in the Palace at Versailles, do you think you would want
Marie Antoinette as a friend? Why or why not?
3. Why is it so important to the King Louis XV that Marie Antoinette speak to
Madame du Barry? Why is it equally important to the Princess that she not address
du Barry?
4. Almost every diary entry has Marie Antoinette writing something about the many
rules of etiquette, customs, and fashions of the French Court. What surprised you
most about how the Princess was expected to look and dress?
5. Would you want Marie Antoinette's mother as your own? Explain.
6. Explain why Marie Antoinette and her husband, King Louis XVI, were executed.
Student Activities�
1. Marie Antoinette was fond of creating lists: things she needed to learn, things
she wanted to write about, things her mother wanted to be. Make a list of five
words that describe Marie Antoinette and five words that describe her husband
Louis. Compare and discuss these lists of words created by each member of your
discussion group.
2. On January 14, 1769, Empress Maria Theresa reprimands her daughter for
neglecting her music lessons saying their empire is the "center of the best music
in the entire world, Vienna is where all the greatest musicians live and study and
work." Listen to some of the music Antonia might have heard in Vienna. Who were the
great musicians of that time period? For more information, see the Historical Note
at the back of Marie Antoinette's diary. Create a display of classical composers
and Vienna during Antonia's life.
3. There are many French words spread throughout Marie Antoinette's diary. Do some
research to find out what each of these words means.�
�� *poup�e�
�� *cheveux�
�� *modiste�
�� *friseur�
�� *remise�
�� *La Pauvre
4. Marie Antoinette lived in two worlds, both artificial fairylands � palaces in
which only appearances counted. Research both cities and design a travel brochure
for both cities based on the information you discover. Which city is your first
choice?
5. Look at the rhyme that was meant to describe Marie Antoinette (September 10,
1770). Create a rhyme that describes another character in this book. Share the
rhyme with your discussion group and see if they can figure out the person you have
portrayed.
6. Marie Antoinette and her family were executed during the French Revolution. Find
out�more about the guillotine machine�that was used to behead them. How do you feel
about capital punishment? Examine the pros and cons then debate the issue with your
friends.
7. Henry David Thoreau, a well-known writer, once said, "Wherever men [or women]
have lived there is a story to be told, and it depends chiefly on the story-teller
or historian whether it is interesting or not." Do you think that Kathryn Lasky,
the writer of Marie Antoinette's diary, succeeded as a story-teller in making the
life of the Princess interesting? Explain.