To the Scaffold: The Life of Marie Antoinette [Paperback]

Carolly Erickson (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 1, 2004 | ISBN-10: 0312322054 | ISBN-13: 978-0312322052

One of history's most misunderstood figures, Marie Antoinette represents the extravagance and the decadence of pre-Revolution France. Yet there was an innocence about Antoinette, thrust as a child into the chillingly formal French court.

Married to the maladroit, ill-mannered Dauphin, Antoinette found pleasure in costly entertainments and garments. She spent lavishly while her overtaxed and increasingly hostile subjects blamed her for France's plight. In time Antoinette matured into a courageous Queen, and when their enemies finally closed in, Antoinette followed her inept husband to the guillotine in one last act of bravery.

In To the Scaffold, Carolly Erickson provides an estimation of a lost Queen that is psychologically acute, richly detailed, and deeply moving.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

This smoothly written biography concentrates on social history, although Erickson ( Bonnie Prince Charlie ) also details the political and economic background of 18th-century France. Marie Antoinette (1755-1793) was raised the daughter of Empress Maria Theresa in the Viennese court of the Hapsburgs, at whose lavish balls and fetes as many as 10,000 guests might dine. But Versailles, where she reigned after marrying King Louis XVI of France, glittered even more, and Erickson recreates its life aptly, describing the elaborate clothes, the duties of courtiers, the rigid etiquette. While the queen's education had equipped her for the role of royal hostess, she was ill-prepared to deal with the intrigues surrounding her. At first timid, fearful and passive, Antoinettesic gradually grew brittle and hardened by "a constant surfeit of pleasures." The author believes the queen had only one extramarital love, a Swedish nobleman named Axel Fersen. And she argues that Antoinette, condemned to death by revolutionaries, finally showed courage and dignity: her last words were an apology to her executioner for accidentally stepping on his foot. Although the book does not add a great deal of new information, it is a highly readable account.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From School Library Journal

YA-- Much maligned in her lifetime, Marie Antoinette is likewise much misunderstood by history, which portrays her as a vain, selfish, and insensitive woman of limited intellect. Erickson attempts to right the wrongs and correct the image of this queen in an easily read biography that avoids both academic cant and "psychohistorical" pretension. Tracing Marie Antoinette from her childhood among her 13 brothers and sisters at the court of her legendary mother, Empress Maria Theresa of Austria, the author portrays her not as the selfish queen of lore but as a reasonably intelligent, opinionated woman of decidedly conservative bent whose ultimate "crime," for which she paid with her life, was having the wrong title in the wrong place at the wrong time. To the Scaffold will be enjoyed by students of European and French history. --Roberta Lisker, W. T. Woodson High School, Fairfax, VA
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 384 pages
• Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin (July 1, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0312322054
• ISBN-13: 978-0312322052
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.1 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (20 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #637,810 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #25 in Books > Biographies & Memoirs > People, A-Z > ( A ) > Antoinette, Marie

More About the Author

Carolly Erickson is the bestselling author of many distinguished works of nonfiction and a series of historical entertainments, blending fact and invention. She lives in Hawaii.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

20 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good But Unfocused Biography, January 17, 2001

By 

Tracy Davis (California, United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: To the Scaffold: The Life of Marie Antoinette (Hardcover)

In Carolly Erickson's biography of Marie Antoinette, "To the Scaffold", the author presents a wonderful picture of an often maligned historical enigma. We see Marie's origins as one of the many daughters of Maria Theresa of Austria (one of the most formidable rulers of all time), her arranged marriage to the future King Louis XVI of France (a man more comfortable in the woodshop than the palace), her fifteen years as Queen of France, and the revolution that portrayed her as silly and evil. Erickson evokes the atmosphere of pre-revolution France well, and little snippets of the excess and immorality of the French upper class was informative (apparently incest was common with fathers and daughters). However, I don't feel that I know much more about Marie than before I read the book. Almost half the book deals with others in her life or the political scene. Also given short attention is the Swedish nobleman who was Marie's long-term lover. It would also have been nice to have a wrap-up of the royal children and the others who played so prominently in Marie's life -- they are simply abandoned, and the book ends abruptly. On one level, this is very effective -- after all, with Marie's death the world she knew ended -- but so many digressions are in the rest of the book, a better ending would have been nice.

16 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars French history is told in a fascinating and riveting manner, June 24, 1997

By A Customer

This review is from: To the Scaffold: The Life of Marie Antoinette (Paperback)

This is one of the most interesting and well-written biographies I've ever read. The author describes pre-revolutionary France as Marie-Antoinette came to it, compares many aspects of Versailles with her Austrian homeland, and continues with a captivating and delightfully interesting tale of life at Versailles. The revolution is explained in an easy to follow and fascinating manner. The reader comes to understand and sympathize with the king and queen as well as learn French history as never before told. I could't put this book down

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars I am suspicious of biography that reads like a novel., January 2, 2008

By 

frumiousb "frumiousb" (Amsterdam, the Netherlands) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 500 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: To the Scaffold: The Life of Marie Antoinette (Paperback)

I am always suspicious of biography that reads like it was historical fiction. Erickson's To the Scaffold is one of this breed. It reads well, particularly at the beginning, but I deeply disliked her narrating details as fact that could really only have been inferred from letters. A certain amount of that can be excused as atmosphere building. I am not too upset when she describes a historical person at a certain moment as pink with health, for instance. However, when she treats certain more controversial aspects of a historical figure as though it were fact instead of a disputed opinion, I get significantly more irritated (for instance, the supposed affair of Marie Antoinette). The way that Erickson uses detail and the unobtrusiveness of the historical sources lends her an unfair feeling of narrative omniscience.

I suppose that there is a case to be made that this sort of text opens accessibility to those who would not normally read historical books. In my view, this is more a kind of dramatization than a real biography. It was satisfying enough to read for entertainment, but I found it wanting as historical text.