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May 10, 2011

K.D. rated it:

Next Saturday, October 16th will be her 217th Death Anniversary. On that same day, 217 years ago, Marie Antoinette or Maria Antonia Josepha Johanna (1755-1793) was executed by guillotine. She was convicted of treason. Nine months prior to that her husband, King Louis XIV was executed. These all happened at the height of the French Revolution (1789-1799).

Marie Antoinette was a victim from birth to death. Her marriage to King Louis XIV was a move to forge alliances among the warring co More...

18 comments like (12 people liked it)

Dec 17, 2009

Jane rated it:

As a former French major in college, I really enjoyed this book and learned so much about this period of time and the dynamics of the monarchy in France. While at times it was difficult to keep all the characters straight since they had multiple names/titles, I found that the overall narrative was compelling. Most people today have little sympathy for this queen, but I came away from this book with a much altered impression of her character and personality. She was truly in an impossible positio More...

0 comments like (5 people liked it)

Dec 17, 2009

Harriet rated it:

This was a good for a beach-ready kind of history. Fraser's good in terms of readability, but she bends over backwards to explain how Antoinette was misunderstood without really coming to terms with the complexity of her public face. I would have liked more footnotes, although I'm probalby not the target audience in that regard. I REALLY would have liked some more editing, not just in terms of overall repetitiousness, but in terms of readability. Fraser writes engagingly and well most of the More...

0 comments like (2 people liked it)

Aug 28, 2008

Amanda rated it:

Three stars for a very well written biography, but minus two for the difficulty in user[reader] friendliness. I don't think I would've read this whole thing if it wasn't so darned interesting to me. It has alot of very difficult words/wording because (in my opinion) it was written by a famous historian rather than a great 'writer' if you will. It's loaded with historical facts about what we know of Marie Antoinette the person, which is extremely interesting especially since she lead such an inte More...

0 comments like (2 people liked it)

Apr 02, 2009

Anne rated it:

Although it took me so long to read it that I had to pay tremendous fines at the library (ahem...) I did enjoy this book and a better understanding of Marie Antoinette. I certainly learned a lot about Marie Antoinette and the French Court and Revolution, and I liked that it was easy to read but not sensationalized.

I was disappointed, though, that Antonia Fraser, rather than simply writing about Marie Antoinette's life, projected across her views of Marie Antoinette through her writi More...

2 comments like (1 person liked it)

May 28, 2011

Bettie rated it:

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here

7 comments like

Dec 26, 2008

Alison rated it:

I enjoyed this quite a bit. I haven't read anything else about Marie Antoinette, but I felt that Fraser did a good job of telling "Marie Antoinette's dramatic story without anticipating its terrible ending," as she writes in the author's note. Here and there she mentions that something will have greater consequences in the future, but she does so in a straightforward manner, with no melodrama.

Much as is the case with Alison Weir's "Six Wives of Henry VIII," Frase More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Sep 16, 2008

Jennifer rated it:

Not only does Antonia Frasier dispell the rumor that Marie Antoinette ever uttered “let them eat cake” when told that the French were starved for bread, she gives a fuller picture of the queen that shows her more than just an extravagant self-involved royal out-of-touch with reality. Frasier packs in gossipy details that keep this from being a dry read.
Marie Antoinette is born to be a pawn in her mother’s (Hapsburg Empress Maria Theresa) bid to expand Hapsburg power and influence. At the a More...

2 comments like (1 person liked it)

Feb 06, 2012

Megan rated it:

I have a slight fascination with Marie Antoinette. She is what led me to study the French Revolution whe I did my minor in History. While in Paris, I wanted to visit everything related to her, and when anything on the History Channel comes on about the French Rev., I must watch it. She is probably one of the most misunderstood monarchs. I suppose it's unjust of me to sympathize with her, but she too, was just a girl. Married at 14 to a prince who knew nothing about how to rule a kingdom. F More...

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Oct 21, 2011

Marcia rated it:

This book was richly detailed, and Fraser clearly spent quite a bit of time in the library researching Marie Antoinette's life. The portrait she creates is extremely sympathetic to the famous queen, and she dispels quite a few common misconceptions about her character. Before reading, I definitely shared a few of those misconceptions, and I now have a better understanding of the woman and the time.

I do wonder just how much Fraser's sympathy for Marie Antoinette colored her interpretat More...

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Sep 19, 2011

Charlie rated it:

The phrase ‘let them eat cake’ has created a false impression.

The book is very well written and the narrative runs quicker than many fiction releases. If this were fiction it would be magnificent. Fraser describes events with good detail, uses plenty of primary sources for quotations, and when she comes to the executions of the family she succeeds in showing how horrific and unjust the situation was.

Fraser presents Marie Antoinette as the unlucky victim of political manoeuvri More...

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Nov 15, 2010

Cassie rated it:

LOVE LOVE LOVE. This book took me a while to get through because of Mrs. Fraser's dense style of writing but also because I tried to savor each moment of this biography. Somehow Antonia Fraser writes in a no nonsense way yet allows the reader to hear the music, and the swish of Marie Antoinette's skirts as she walked through Versailles. This book takes the reader on a journey through an incredible life, causing me to laugh, cry and at one point throw the book I was so incensed at the injustic More...

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Sep 20, 2010

Marianne rated it:

I knew a little about Marie Antoinette, not loads but you know the usual - Austrian princess, unhappy marriage, decadence, blamed for the revolution, misquoted with the 'let them eat cake', beheaded, the end type knowledge that everyone knows. I mean, it went a little further, but no more than the stuff that got covered in an hour long documentary. With that in mind, I gotta confess that when I was reminded of how much that period intrigues me, I kinda jumped all over the chance at getting a bit More...

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Jan 08, 2010

Elena rated it:

My copy of Lady Antonia Fraser's "Marie-Antoinette, The Journey" (Anchor Books, 2002) sports on its cover the round face of Kirsten Dunst which, as anyone who has studied portraits of Marie-Antoinette knows, is in sharp contrast to the lovely oval countenance of the real queen. I found it annoying, at first. However, while reading the international best seller, I came to see the photo from the Coppola film as suitable for a book which, at times, sacrifices historical exegesis to the de More...

0 comments like (6 people liked it)

Jan 02, 2010

Mina rated it:

What most people think of when they hear the name, Marie Antoinette, is opulent dresses, cluelessness at the plight of the impoverished ("Let them eat cake") and her ultimate fate under the guillotine.

This book portrays the French Queen less as a villain, but more sympathetically as a carefree teenager whose response to the overwhelming pressures that she felt was to revel in a hedonistic lifestyle. She was vilified by the French as being sex-crazed and completely ignorant More...

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Nov 11, 2009

Jo rated it:

What a treat! I love the work of Antonia Fraser and I've been looking forward to reading her take on Marie Antoinette, one of the most misunderstood figures in Western History. This biography tracks indeed the journey of a fourteen year old girl-bride, uprooted from her home and landed in a foreign court where she was viewed with suspicion and prejudice, to her rise to a position of authority without power, as the consort to the king of France in the most challenging of times, to her demise on t More...

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Aug 17, 2009

Tiffany rated it:

This book really covered all the historical background one could ever want of "Antoine". Fraser really knows how to flesh out historical figures. Maybe there is too much fleshing out, some of the book tends to get swamped out with too much fact and names, but I still stayed hooked, and learned a lot about the French Queen that I never knew, but am glad I do now. At no time did she say "And let them eat cake!" She was cut off from her people by her own situation, but she was i More...

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Jul 09, 2009

Sarai rated it:

Amazon.com Review
In the past, Antonia Fraser's bestselling histories and biographies have focused on people and events in her native England, from Mary Queen of Scots to Faith and Treason: The Story of the Gunpowder Plot. Now she crosses the Channel to limn the life of France's unhappiest queen, bringing along her gift for fluent storytelling, vivid characterization, and evocative historical background. Marie Antoinette (1755-93) emerges in Fraser's sympathetic portrait as a goodhearted gi More...

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Dec 16, 2009

sera rated it:

I love Antonia Fraiser's writing style; she makes history fun. This book was very entertaining, easy reading.

I picked it up after visiting Versailles in March---it's the kind of place you want to know more about. I did also see Sofia Coppola's movie, based on this book. I have to say: read the book. You will find that Marie Anoinette's life was much more than cakes and shoes (although I for one did enjoy the flights of New Order and little dogs in Sofia's rendition).

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Dec 01, 2009

Jay rated it:

I've read more than my fair share of novels on Marie Antoinette, and so far this one has to be my favourite. Not only is this book quite descriptive and provides quite a bit of anecdotes about her life. I enjoyed the way the chapters were titled after conversations between people or pamphlets. The photographic pages enclosed within the book were also appreciated.

Although I'm not a fan of the movie that was based off this book (though I do adore the costuming), I can definitely se More...

1 comment like

Sep 10, 2011

Jennifer rated it:

Antonia Fraser's Marie Antoinette seems to be the most correct biography I've ever read. She didn't fluff it up with any nonsense. It paints the doomed queen as she really was, beautiful but lazy and not overly intelligent. Marie Antoinette was simply a chess piece for her mother to move and control. Antonia Fraser made it clear that this Queen of France was probably one of the most misunderstood and falsely maligned personalities of the French Revolution, she was accused of many things and none More...

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Mar 02, 2009

Lynne-marie rated it:

I have already proclaimed my admiration for Fraser; I will not reiderate that here. It is far too easy from the public viewpoint to have a simplistic picture of Marie Antoinette and her life & death. Fraser documents the more complex interlocking facts of her life: hated from the first by the people of France as an alien pawn of her mother Maria Theresa's Habsburg Empire, Maria enjoyed a brief period of popularity and then fell again into deeper and deeper disrepute in France. She, herself, h More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Nov 21, 2009

Kaye rated it:

After visiting Paris and Versailles this summer I wanted to learn more about the history of France and in particularly Marie Antoinette. This book tells the story of a 15 year old Marie Antoinette who is wed for political reasons to the French Dauphin. Neither are well educated or prepared to become King and Queen at early ages. Fraser is a detailed historian and particularly in the first half, explained how she came to conclusions about very intimate parts of life at Versailles. There are m More...

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Apr 16, 2009

Kelly rated it:

This is my kind of history. If those shows on the history channel about medieval weapons are history for boys, this is history for the girlies. It feels like reading an 18th century tabloid. In a really good way. I could not put it down, not even to brush my hair. (I needed one of Marie's famous horse-hair wigs). I loved the politics, the history, and Frasier's analysis, artfully dotted with details about the cut and fabric of her gowns, the food on her table, and the horribly wacky rules of li More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Sep 19, 2011

Mooch rated it:

I do not even feel very entitled to comment on Ms. Fraser's work. The reason is that the edition that I picked up from the library was a German language edition. I learned later on that this edition was shortened heavily. Well, I do not like a publishing company to decide what parts I should be reading and what parts I shouldn't. I sense I would have given the work in all its length four stars but the shortened version gets only three. I was intrigued by Marie Antoinette's life story and I enjoy More...

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Apr 06, 2010

Tatiana rated it:

I am not a history buff, so it's hard for me to judge if this book is historically accurate. What I can attest to is that Antonia Fraser knows how to write a very engaging non-fictional narrative. And from my limited experience with non-fiction, it is a hard thing to do.

"Marie Antoinette" doesn't appear to be an overly objective book, the tone of it is very involved and I guess that's what makes it so readable. Fraser paints a very sympathetic portrait of Marie Antoinette, More...

4 comments like (3 people liked it)

Nov 23, 2009

Rob rated it:

Through solid research and observation Fraser unfolds the social and psychological formation of Marie Antoinette, the woman, wife, mother and queen. A portrait is painted of the ill-fated queen who found herself in the quirky and tumultuous cultural, social and political atmosphere of late 18th c. France. Fate and poor judgment within that mix caused the downfall of the royal family and the emergence of an icon in the person of Marie Antoinette.

I enjoyed the book very much. Fraser More...

1 comment like

Dec 12, 2011

Nancy rated it:

An in-depth biography of the infamous queen, and one that cuts through the many stories that still swirl around this well-known figure. The author presents the reader with a more accurate picture of the doomed queen and makes the reader all the more interested because it is a complex portrait of Marie Antoinette's life. In Fraser's hands, Marie Antoinette comes to life as flawed, yes, certainly flawed individual, but a woman with whom the reader cannot fail to feel sympathy for, especially since More...

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Sep 09, 2011

Brian rated it:

Part of the reason I read this was to form an opinion on whether Marie Antoniette was a great historical personage, or just a figurehead who was lucky to be born into royalty and ended up in the wrong place at the wrong time during a tumultuous moment in history, or for better/worse, by her actions helped to initiate the French Revolution

Fraser’s book seems to take the viewpoint that Antoinette was generally a good and kind queen with many instances of charitable work, who doesn’t de More...

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May 24, 2011

Nina added it

I've got to admit with all the things we have heard about Marie Antoinette through History, it was always with an unsympathetic edge - indicating that both she and Louis deserved their decapitation. Most of us know her for being extravagent and for the saying - let them eat cake - which according to this book by Antonia Fraser, was never her saying. This is a sympathetic view of the trials and tribulations of one of France's most well recognised historical figures. I enjoyed reading it and have More...

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