The Long Eighteenth Century
Rebel of the Regency
I’ve been following Ann Foster around the internet for awhile now. In her popular podcast, Vulgar History, and now in her substack Vulgar History A La Carte, Foster uses wit and impeccable research to shine the light on historical women whose stories have been forgotten or told through a misogynist lens. Obviously this is my…
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Fairy Tales, Pt. 4 Madame d’Aulnoy Coins the Term “contés de fees”(fairy tales)
As best I can tell, Marie-Catherine Le Jumel de Barneville, Baroness[1] d’Aulnoy (1652-1705) led a wild life. At the age of 13, she was married to the Baron d’Aulnoy, who was a “freethinker,”[2] a gambler, and thirty years her senior. Three years and three children later, her husband was accused of treason. The accusations were…
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Fairy Tales, Pt 2: Antoine Galland and the Arabian Nights
When I sat down to write about Charles Perrault and Tales of Mother Goose, I had no intention of writing more about the writers who “created” fairy tales as we know them . But as I wrote about Perrault I remembered some of my favorite stories,[1] and stumbled across a new one. Suddenly a small…
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