Dancing Queen
Marie De Médicis' Ballets at the Court of Henri IV
Seiten
2020
University of Toronto Press (Verlag)
978-1-4875-2679-5 (ISBN)
University of Toronto Press (Verlag)
978-1-4875-2679-5 (ISBN)
Dancing Queen takes up court ballet as a window into Marie de Médicis’s use of the performing arts as a vehicle for politically engaged queenship prior to Henri IV’s assassination in 1610.
Under glittering lights in the Louvre palace, the French court ballets danced by Queen Marie de Médicis prior to Henri IV’s assassination in 1610 attracted thousands of spectators ranging from pickpockets to ambassadors from across Europe. Drawing on newly discovered primary sources as well as theories and methodologies derived from literary studies, political history, musicology, dance studies, and women’s and gender studies, Dancing Queen traces how Marie’s ballets authorized her incipient political authority through innovative verbal and visual imagery, avant-garde musical developments, and ceremonial arrangements of objects and bodies in space. Making use of women’s "semi-official" status as political agents, Marie’s ballets also manipulated the subtle social and cultural codes of international courtly society in order to more deftly navigate rivalries and alliances both at home and abroad.
At times the queen’s productions could challenge Henri IV’s immediate interests, contesting the influence enjoyed by his mistresses or giving space to implied critiques of official foreign policy, for example. Such defenses of Marie’s own position, though, took shape as part of a larger governmental program designed to promote the French consort queen’s political authority not in its own right but as a means of maintaining power for the new Bourbon monarchy in the event of Henri IV’s untimely death.
Under glittering lights in the Louvre palace, the French court ballets danced by Queen Marie de Médicis prior to Henri IV’s assassination in 1610 attracted thousands of spectators ranging from pickpockets to ambassadors from across Europe. Drawing on newly discovered primary sources as well as theories and methodologies derived from literary studies, political history, musicology, dance studies, and women’s and gender studies, Dancing Queen traces how Marie’s ballets authorized her incipient political authority through innovative verbal and visual imagery, avant-garde musical developments, and ceremonial arrangements of objects and bodies in space. Making use of women’s "semi-official" status as political agents, Marie’s ballets also manipulated the subtle social and cultural codes of international courtly society in order to more deftly navigate rivalries and alliances both at home and abroad.
At times the queen’s productions could challenge Henri IV’s immediate interests, contesting the influence enjoyed by his mistresses or giving space to implied critiques of official foreign policy, for example. Such defenses of Marie’s own position, though, took shape as part of a larger governmental program designed to promote the French consort queen’s political authority not in its own right but as a means of maintaining power for the new Bourbon monarchy in the event of Henri IV’s untimely death.
Melinda J. Gough is a professor of English and cultural studies at McMaster University.
List of Illustrations
Acknowledgments
Abbreviations
Principles of Transcription and Translation
Introduction
1 Magnificence, Mistresses, and Marie’s Dance of Maternity
2 Royal Women’s Ballet and/as Royal Ceremonial
3 Alliances and Others
4 Eros and "Absolutism"
5 Dances of Diplomacy: London, Valladolid, Paris
Conclusion
Appendices
Appendix 1: Verse Texts for the Ballet of the Sixteen Virtues (1602)
Appendix 2: Verse Texts for the Ballet of Diana and her Nymphs (1609)
Appendix 3: Verse Texts for the Ballet de Madame (1609)
Notes
Bibliography
Index
| Erscheinungsdatum | 27.07.2020 |
|---|---|
| Verlagsort | Toronto |
| Sprache | englisch |
| Maße | 152 x 229 mm |
| Gewicht | 520 g |
| Themenwelt | Literatur ► Biografien / Erfahrungsberichte |
| Kunst / Musik / Theater ► Theater / Ballett | |
| Geschichte ► Allgemeine Geschichte ► Neuzeit (bis 1918) | |
| ISBN-10 | 1-4875-2679-2 / 1487526792 |
| ISBN-13 | 978-1-4875-2679-5 / 9781487526795 |
| Zustand | Neuware |
| Informationen gemäß Produktsicherheitsverordnung (GPSR) | |
| Haben Sie eine Frage zum Produkt? |
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Buch | Hardcover (2024)
C.H.Beck (Verlag)
CHF 47,60
