Marie Antoinette

Marie Antoinette is a figure who shows great beauty and is often regarded as a fashion icon. Her extravagant dresses and hats and hair top all the rest.

Caroline Webber talks about how Marie Antoinette's fashion choices relate to her rule over france. The stereotypical people of france are unreasonably fancy and snooty. Perhaps Marie Antoinette's obsession with fashion contributed to this stereotype. She continued to buy clothes and did not do anything about her country's deteriorating economic status. Although, she also became a fashion icon of the time. People looked at her and were incredibly jealous of her. She used this as a means for power over her subjects. She dressed like no other monarch before her. She sometimes would cross dress when she went on hunts, binding her chest to look like a man. She used clothing to make herself look more powerful. "In Truth, Marie Antoinette's Clothing expenditures accounted for a negligible portion of the overall budget outlined in Necker's report, but her ostentatious image belied the economic reality." This infuriated her subjects, but as we have talked about in class, this is one of the ways one can gain power. Not only did Marie Antoinette wear extravagant clothing, she also was famous for her extremely complicated hairdos. She didn't care about what her people needed, she used materials life flour to adorn her hair, even when the peasants had a limited supply of bread and were starving in the streets. She became a celebrity of the time, and although she was not doing the best job of running the country, people were very excited to see what she was wearing and what kind of interesting things she would comment on with her fashion. Ultimately the unhappiness of her people caught up with her, and she was beheaded, but she was still concerned with her image, even on her final days.

There is also a large power struggle depicted between Marie Antoinette and her palace. She was controlled from day one. ""in this way, Marie Antoinette and her adversaries engaged in a fierce tug-of-war to control her sartorial body : a struggle she had been waging in some form or other since her first day on French Soil.This power struggle represents the life of many kings and queens. This eventually got her into trouble.

Queen Elizabeth

Queen Elizabeth is certainly an icon. When people think of power, Queen Elizabeth comes to mind. This is not only because the visual aspects of her period costume are very memorable, but also because she is one of the few female monarchs who ruled a kingdom because of her brains. Apart from her relation to King Henry and the rest, she made a name for herself through smarts and by not giving into the opposite sex. She did not want to be dragged down by men who only wanted to steal her power, she wanted the power to rule her own kingdom, and she wanted people to believe she was competent enough to do so. But ruling a kingdom is not easy. Elizabeth had to watch out for danger at every corner. People were constantly trying to poison her, to steal her throne. Queen Elizabeth was generally liked by her citizens, and Elizabeth also tried to keep on good terms with other countries. She was also revered by the protestants, for she supported the church of england. Religion often caused many conflicts. Elizabeth is a perfect example of royalty. She was loved, and hated by many, and she is still known by almost everyone today. (I was partly named after Queen Elizabeth I). The struggles she went through and her extreme intelligence make her a queen who went down in history.

Orlando

The story of Orlando takes a deep look into the differences between Gender in society. It also is a commentary on biographies. Orlando begins the story as a man, a writer, and a young child. The book spans many years (far longer than any one person could ever live). As a man, Orlando is overcome by desires for women, and there is much talk about how men become fools in front of women. They want them so much, and yet they sacrifice they're own minds to do so. Women on the other hand, have large responsibilities to be who society wishes them to be. They need to wear fancy clothes and remain innocent and chaste, yet be likable. Orlando studies both sexes, as he experiences life as both, and concludes mostly that there are few core differences. "It is a strange fact, but a true one, that up to this moment she had scarcely given her sex a thought."Orlando is the same person, as a man, and as a woman. Though the way society views him/her is quite different. This poses interesting questions regarding gender in today's society. Woman politicians are still rare these days, and men continue to dominate the work force and political world. This story relates to our kings and queens thesis mainly because we are creating a biography, and because the dynamic between the sexes has been an ongoing and ever changing phenomenon. Like Virginia Woolf, I find most biographies dry and dull, the do not peak my interest the way an exciting work of fiction would. But as an illustrator, it is my job to tell a story through pictures, perhaps more interesting than it might be had it been told in photographs. It will be interesting to see how the thesis topics differ when told by a man or a woman, and how the male and female monarchs have been portrayed through each.