The Rose of Martinique by Andrea Stuart

The Rose of Martinique by Andrea Stuart

One of the most potent icons of female sexuality, Josephine has largely been reduced to an empty cipher, the butt of one of the oldest jokes around. Hitherto, her life has been portrayed almost entirely in connection with Napoleon, but that relationship, fascinating though it undoubtedly was, was only a tiny fraction of the life she led as a Caribbean women in the salons of eighteenth-century Paris. Andrea Stuart shares with her subject a Caribbean background and is able to offer a unique insight into the world which Josephine left as a plump schoolgirl for Paris and marriage to her cousin, Viscount Alexandre Beauharnais. Expecting an exotic Creole bride, Beaharnais set about a radical transformation and the dowdy teenager soon became a sophisticated sensual beauty, the darling of the pre-revolutionary salons. As the revolution reached its endgame, Josephine, now widowed with two small children, met her Emperor and the rest, as they say, is history. More eventful than the most lurid novel, no single life so embodies the vice and virtues, the tumult and dangers of the period through which she lived. By reconstructing Josephine's life and world, Andrea Stuart brilliantly captures the extraordinary drama of the age and its unique atmosphere and social significance.

Andrea Stuart was brought up in the Caribbean and the US. She has lived in Paris and now lives in London. She is the author of two acclaimed biographies, Showgirls, about Josephine Baker, published by Jonathan Cape in 1996 and Josephine: The Rose of Martinique, a biography of the Empress Josephine, published by Macmillan in 2003. She is co-editor of the Black Film Bulletin and Fiction Editor of Critical Quarterly.

SKU	Unavailable
ISBN 13	9780333739334
ISBN 10	0333739337
Title	The Rose of Martinique
Author	Andrea Stuart
Condition	Unavailable
Binding Type	Hardback
Publisher	Pan Macmillan
Year published	2003-09-05
Number of pages	464
Cover note	Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary.
Note	Unavailable