Madame De Maintenon by Veronica Buckley
A Biography of the Secret Wife of Louis XIV
Veronica Buckley’s second book, Madame de Maintenon, was originally due to be published in May but the book stirred up a storm of literary righteous indignation when it was discovered that Buckley had based a large amount of her work a non-existent diary.
Buckley had relied heavily on what she believed to be the secret diaries of Louis XIV but the diaries, discovered in a house in the Loire Valley in 1997, were actually the work of French academic Francois Bluche. Whether Buckley’s mistake was understandable or a massive historical clanger, the initial print run of Madame de Maintenon had to be pulped and so the book was only finally published in July.
It is truly a shame that the furore surrounding Buckley’s source material has rather eclipsed the publication of Madame de Maintenon since it is actually a well written and intriguing biography that has a lot to offer the reader.
Madame de Maintenon
Constant d’Aubigne and his wife Jeanne de Cardillac were both imprisoned on suspicion of being English spies when their daughter Francoise was born. After they were released from prison, the family moved to the island of Martinique in the Caribbean where Constant d’Aubigne had hopes of becoming a successful planter. In reality, he died in poverty two years after their arrival in Martinique leaving his wife and children to return penniless to France.
Although poor, Francoise was both beautiful and witty and she soon became a fixture in the fashionable salons of Paris. At one such gathering Francoise met Paul Scarron the famous poet and novelist. Francoise and Scarron quickly struck up a friendship and, knowing of her financial difficulties, Scarron offered to either sponsor her admission to a convent or marry her. Taking the decision that convent life wasn’t for her, Francoise agreed to marry Scarron despite the fact that his being severely disabled meant that she was more nurse than wife to him.
After Scarron died in 1660 Francoise chose to provide for herself by becoming a governess to the children of her friend Madame de Montespan. This was no ordinary governess job for Madame de Montespan was the secret mistress of King Louis XIV and so her children were the illegitimate offspring of the Sun King.
The Wife of the Sun King
Despite her poor start in life, Francoise had a good grasp of the classics, French literature, Spanish and Italian and she found her job as governess to be hugely rewarding. She lived with the household of Madame de Montespan first at Vaugirard and later at court at Versailles.
Eventually King Louis grew tired of the charms of Madame de Montespan and turned his attention to his children’s governess. Although Francoise refused to become his mistress on religious grounds, Louis gave her the title of Marquise de Maintenon and spent every available moment with her talking about politics and religion.
Following the death of Queen Marie-Therese in 1683, Louis XIV married Francoise in a small, private ceremony. The difference in their social status meant that the marriage could not be acknowledged publically and that Francoise could never become Queen.
An Impressive Life
That Madame de Maintenon achieved so much having started with so little is truly amazing. With Madame de Maintenon Veronica Buckley has succeeded in giving Francoise her rightful place in history and restoring a reputation that had been tarnished by the long held, albeit false, belief that, as a committed Catholic, she was responsible for her husband’s persecution of the Protestants. Buckley even goes so far as to argue that Francoise was nowhere near as religious as was generally believed and so she had no opinion either way as to what was the correct religion.
Madame de Maintenon is a fitting tribute to a remarkable woman. Francoise d’Aubigne managed a meteoric rise to a position of great importance both socially and politically pure through her own intelligence and determination.
Madame de Maintenon: The Secret Wife of Louis XIV by Veronica Buckley
ISBN 978-0747580987, 2008, Bloomsbury, £25.00, pp 480
