Mademoiselle
Page 49
12 something of a health hazard: See Weber, Peasants into Frenchmen, for more on the scarcity of fresh water in much of late-nineteenth-century France. “If washing linens was rare, washing oneself was an exception.… Even in towns few made a habit of washing or bathing.” Weber, 148.
13 seawater mixed with olive oil: Claude Delay, Chanel Solitaire (1974; repr., Paris: Gallimard, 1983), 19.
14 suffered from pulmonary ailments: Gilberte Devolle’s death in 1869 on Geneanet: http://gw0.geneanet.org/bernard3111?lang=en&p=jeanne&n=devolle.
15 tying scarves around: Delay, 16.
16 “I would hear people speak”: Haedrich, 23–24.
17 “One has a father”: Ibid., 24.
18 had just begun to flourish: Charles-Roux, 70–75.
19 Gabrielle never told a soul: Claude Delay suggests that Chanel spoke of preparing her mother’s corpse for burial and kissing her cold lips one last time. It is unclear if Delay inferred this or if Chanel actually admitted these facts to her. Delay, 71–72.
20 their granddaughter Julia: Claude Delay believes that Virginie-Angelina would have accepted the girls into her already-crowded home, but that Henri Chanel would not agree to it. Delay, 19.
21 relatives distinctly recalled hearing: Charles-Roux, 79. In an interview with Pierre Galante, a niece of Chanel’s recalled, “I sometimes heard an uncle, an aunt, or a cousin ask: ‘Where are the girls?’ and my mother would answer, ‘At Aubazine.’ ” Quoted in Pierre Galante, Mademoiselle Chanel, trans. Eileen Geist and Jessie Wood (Chicago: Henry Regnery Company, 1973), 14.
22 penchant for effacing all evidence: Charles-Roux, 79.
23 “a vast, ancient and very beautiful”: Quoted in Vilmorin, 60.
24 “They tore everything away”: Quoted in Charles-Roux, 79.
25 minimal help from Henri Chanel: Charles-Roux, 87–90.
26 “At six years old”: Morand, L’Allure de Chanel, 13.
27 “A little before he left”: Ibid., 24.
28 fathered at least one more: Years later, his son Lucien discovered Albert Chanel living with another woman, and reported back to his grandparents the lamentable state of his father’s life. Still drinking heavily and in trouble with the law, Albert had taken to passing off dime-store household goods as the heirlooms of a bankrupt aristocrat in need of fast cash. Driving around in a finely appointed carriage he’d borrowed, Albert would claim to be a duke’s personal valet, and talk guileless peasants into parting with large sums of money, convincing them that the worthless trinkets he was peddling offered a sound investment—that they were actually a duke’s treasures being sold at steep discount. Upon receiving news of Albert’s exploits, the entire Chanel clan—including even his own parents—broke off contact permanently with this black sheep of the family. Charles-Roux, 244.
29 at her own naked body: See Theodore Zeldin, “The Conflict of Moralities: Confession, Sin and Pleasure in the Nineteenth Century,” in Conflicts in French Society, ed. Theodore Zeldin (London: George Allen and Unwin, 1970), 13–50. Historian of French Catholicism Ralph Gibson writes, “The body in the continuing Tridentine tradition, was regarded as the great enemy: at the end of the century, a sister would pass a dry chemise to a young boarder after a bath (which was also taken in a chemise), saying, ‘Raise your eyes to Heaven, my child!’ so that she would not see her own body.” Gibson, A Social History of French Catholicism 1789–1914 (London: Routledge, 1989), 119.
30 “In a normal family”: Quoted in Haedrich, 33.
31 “I understand my father”: Ibid., 24.
32 “How I loved”: Morand, L’Allure de Chanel, 27.
33 “Eggs, chicken, sausages”: Quoted in Haedrich, 28.
34 “I thought often of death”: Morand, L’Allure de Chanel, 26.
35 “I would return in secret”: Ibid., 17.
36 “everyone else found ugly”: Vilmorin, 20.
37 “queen of this secret garden”: Morand, L’Allure de Chanel, 17.
38 “Unlike children who”: Vilmorin, 28.
39 “I said ‘Father’ ”: Haedrich, 28.
40 “Woe to anyone”: Edmonde Charles-Roux, quoted in Sophie Grassin, “L’art de vivre,” Madame Figaro, April 17, 2009.
41 “make use of her”: Gabrielle Chanel to Soeur Marie-Xavier, Conservatoire Chanel, Paris. Thank you to Cécile Goddet-Dirles for directing me to these documents and for her interpretation of both handwriting and the letters’ tone.
42 minimize religion’s role: The state pursued this goal via multiple avenues, including laws designed to secularize education and medical care—both of which had been heavily dominated by the church. Minister of Education Jules Ferry issued decrees in 1880 demanding the expulsion of any religious order running a school that lacked official government permission. The famous lois laïques, or secularization laws, of the 1880s banned clergy outright from teaching in state primary schools. By the century’s close, many in the church felt that the spirit of the Concordat had been abandoned altogether. See Emile Ollivier, Le Concordat, est-il respecté? (Paris: Garnier Frères, 1883). Ollivier, a scholar and critic of the Académie française, reserved special disdain for the school system, which he felt had begun teaching “partisan books without conscience or intellectual probity, which denature facts and insult truth perpetually.” Ibid., 25. Ollivier lamented particularly the lack of respect for France’s monarchical and imperialist history, “that great French royalty,” that “brought civilization to peoples throughout Europe.” Ibid., 28.
43 Dreyfus was vilified: To promote its goal of purging the nation of such pernicious outsiders, La Croix even established a “Justice and Equality Committee,” dedicated to blocking “Jews, Masons, and Socialists” in national and regional elections. The committee soon had a network of branches throughout the country. See Maurice Larkin, Church and State After the Dreyfus Affair (1973; repr., New York: Harper and Row, 1974), 24. See also Roger Price, A Social History of Nineteenth-Century France (London: Hutchinson, 1987).
44 conspiracy between the Republicans: See Larkin, 66; and Price, 283.
45 outspoken anti-Dreyfusard: Delay, 26.
46 “unwilling or unable to marry”: According to Gibson, “a third of the founders of successful congregations were the daughters of artisans, small traders, peasants, or salaried workers.” Gibson, 118. See also Richard D. E. Burton, Holy Tears, Holy Blood: Women, Catholicism, and the Culture of Suffering in France, 1840–1970 (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 2004).
47 female congregations offered many types: In his landmark study of Frenchwomen in the Catholic church, Le Catholicisme au féminin, historian Claude Langlois attributes the success and growth of these congregations partly to women’s desire for work and independence: “In the nineteenth century, congregations are practically alone in furnishing … such varied types of female employment … whence their success.” Claude Langlois, Le Catholicisme au féminin: Les congrégations Françaises à supérieure générale au XIXe siècle (Paris: Editions du Cerf, 1984), 643.
48 supervising hundreds of women: See Langlois 643, and Gibson, 118.
49 starched white headresses: Edmonde Charles-Roux has remarked on the influence of the nuns’ habit on Chanel’s later fashions. Charles-Roux, 84.
50 tamp down individual personalities: Discussing the many restrictions imposed by Catholic orders, Gibson writes, “Convents and monasteries adopted the same techniques as did seminaries to control any kind of individuality or deviance.… The conventual rule prescribed the detailed control of bodily movements, down to the posture of head and torso, the direction of the eyes, the number of genuflections, etc.—a technique which we now understand was an essential part of subjecting individuals to authority. The religious habit itself was clearly designed to suppress individuality.” Gibson, 132.
51 “I have hated when”: Morand, L’Allure de Chanel, 66.
52 “I was a child”: Ibid., 20.
53 novels she devoured in secret: The Catholic chur
ch had long disapproved strongly of novels, which they deemed a morally corrupting influence on girls and young women. But by the 1890s, the strict prohibitions against reading popular fiction loosened, and teenaged girls—even in a convent orphanage—would have been able to get their hands on such literary contraband. Michela De Giorgio traces the Church’s response in France to the recreational reading of novels by young girls. Michela De Giorgio, “La Bonne Catholique,” trans. Sylvia Milanesi and Pascale Koch, in Histoire des Femmes, ed. Georges Duby and Michelle Perrot (Paris: Plon, 1991), 170–97.
54 “a sentimental hack”: Delay, 24.
55 newspapers that serialized them: Haedrich, 66.
56 promoted the new art form: With writer Eugène Guggenheim, Decourcelle cofounded the Cinematographic Society of Authors and Litterateurs (the Société Cinématographique des Auteurs et Gens de Lettres, or SCAGL, in French), established to adapt popular literature for the screen.
57 uses her newfound fortune: Pierre Decourcelle, La Danseuse au couvent (Paris: C. Lévy, 1883).
58 mother and son are reunited: Pierre Decourcelle, Les Deux Gosses (1880; repr., Paris: Fayard, 1950).
59 “Those novels taught me”: Morand, L’Allure de Chanel, 20.
60 “He was already an old”: Quoted in Haedrich, 34.
61 seats off to either side: Charles-Roux, 100.
62 “a true Lucifer”: Morand, L’Allure de Chanel, 20.
63 world-famous jockeys: Charles-Roux, 91–114.
64 jackets with goatskin closures: Ibid.
65 “charming illusions”: Morand, L’Allure de Chanel, 16.
66 perfect, even stitches: Charles-Roux, 96–100.
67 medicinal powers remain legendary: The great seventeenth-century writer Madame de Sévigné claimed to have cured a severe paralysis in her hands by taking the waters at Vichy, thus saving her literary career. Chanel’s personal library contained the published letters of Madame de Sévigné—might she have known of Sévigné’s connection to Vichy waters? Library inventory list, Conservatoire Chanel, Paris.
68 “passwords to a great”: Morand, L’Allure de Chanel, 30.
69 “play at being great ladies”: Ibid., 26.
70 shop catering to cavalrymen: Charles-Roux, 105–22.
71 rooster and a lost dog: We know of Chanel’s early foray into cabaret singing from an interview conducted by Charles-Roux with Carlo Colcombet, who had been stationed near Moulins while in the army and had attended Coco’s performances at La Rotonde. Carlo Colcombet remained a lifelong friend of Chanel’s. Charles-Roux, 125.
72 “She was a prude”: Quoted in Charles-Roux, 124.
2. A NEW WORLD AND A NEW LIFE
1 “Society women”: Quoted in Haedrich, 51.
2 never wound up marrying: For a comprehensive history of every class of prostitution in France during this time, see Alain Corbin, Women for Hire: Prostitution and Sexuality in France After 1850, trans. Alan Sheridan (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1990). Originally published in French as Les Filles de noce: Misère sexuelle et prostitution aux 19è et 20è siècles (Paris: Flammarion, 1978).
3 off with her young man: André’s birthdate and other details are found in his police dossier at the Archives de la Préfecture de police de Paris. Hereafter cited as Paris police archives.
4 paternity in exchange for payment: André’s daughter, Gabrielle Palasse-Labrunie, states, “What is certain is that Antoine Palasse was not the father: this is what I always heard my aunt and my father say.” Isabelle Fiemeyer and Gabrielle Palasse-Labrunie, Intimate Chanel (Paris: Flammarion, 2011), 33.
5 died in the month of May: Isabelle Fiemeyer, Coco Chanel: Un parfum de mystère (Paris: Editions Payot, 1999), 53.
6 driving the bereft Julia: Lilou Marquand mentions Julia’s suicide and Chanel’s possible instigation of it. Marquand, 66.
7 track record of liaisons: In her later years, Chanel also became jealously possessive of her models and would often try to keep them from going home to their husbands and boyfriends, trying to “steal” them away from any other attachments. She never lost her hunger to “beat out” everyone around her in the race for love. This habit has been noted by a large number of former acquaintances.
8 unofficially adopting André: Fiemeyer and Palasse-Labrunie, Intimate Chanel, 33.
9 Labrunie permits herself: Gabrielle Palasse-Labrunie, conversation with author, March 2011.
10 enjoy his vast inheritance: Charles-Roux, 128.
11 “blind eye to his mistresses”: Quoted in Fiemeyer and Palasse-Labrunie, Intimate Chanel, 27.
12 hints of such excursions: Haedrich, 43.
13 “Vichy … that doesn’t exist”: Edmonde Charles-Roux reported that when asked about her time in Vichy, Chanel would grow ferociously angry and deny any connection to the city. Quoted in Sophie Grassin, “Chanel aurait été folle de vous!” Madame Figaro, April 9, 2009.
14 “You won’t get anywhere”: Charles-Roux relates Balsan’s remark, via the recollection of Carlo Colcombet. Charles-Roux, 128.
15 from hangovers to gallstones: Charles-Roux, 141–42; Madsen, 27ff.
16 her grandfather at Vichy: She told Morand about her grandfather’s Vichy cure. Morand, L’Allure de Chanel, 29.
17 “I think she closed”: Sophie Grassin, “Chanel aurait été folle de vous! Edmonde Charles-Roux à Audrey Tatou,” Madame Figaro, April 18, 2009, 84.
18 “His friends would tell him”: Morand, L’Allure de Chanel, 33.
19 “bisexual demimondaine”: Ibid. Immortalized by the likes of Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec and Jules Chéret, the self-named d’Alençon (born Emilie André, to a Montmartre concierge) had left a long series of illustrious lovers in her wake—including Leopold II, king of Belgium. She had also earned special fame for her ability to incite aristocratic men into frenzies of lavish spending, which had bankrupted entire families. Emilienne’s most famous feat was having driven a certain Duke of Uzès into spending his entire family fortune on jewels for her. The duke’s desperate mother had him shipped off to the Congo to keep him away from her, where he soon died of dysentery. Balsan, however, thrifty by nature, had managed to avoid ruining himself financially with Emilienne. Charles-Roux, 153.
20 “You could breathe”: Delay, 34.
21 “Beauty, youth, those things”: Haedrich, 47–48.
22 marrying Consuelo Vanderbilt: See Consuelo Vanderbilt Balsan, The Glitter and the Gold: The American Duchess in Her Own Words (1953; repr., New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2012); and Amanda Mackenzie Stewart, Consuelo and Alva Vanderbilt: The Story of a Daughter and a Mother in the Gilded Age (New York: HarperPerennial, 2007).
23 a bona fide princess: After the prince’s death, Pougy took the veil and lived out her life as Sister Mary Magdalene of the Penitence in a Swiss convent. See Claude Conyers, “Courtesans in Dance History,” Dance History Chronicle 26, no. 2 (2003): 219–43.
24 dabbled in lesbianism: Emilienne d’Alençon was the author of a collection of lesbian poetry entitled Sous le masque (Beneath the Mask), published in 1918. See also Liane de Pougy, My Blue Notebooks: The Intimate Journal of Paris’s Beautiful and Notorious Courtesan: Liane de Pougy, trans. Diana Athill (New York: Tarches/Putnam, 2002). Originally published in French as Mes cahiers bleus (Paris: Plon, 1977).
25 “enormous pies balanced”: Morand, L’Allure de Chanel, 40.
26 new riding boots: Charles-Roux, 158–62.
27 “You have to imagine”: Ibid., 168.
28 one mischievous monkey: Galante, 23.
29 entire scheme as a lark: Charles-Roux, 203–4.
30 “vast game for the wealthy”: Vilmorin, 76.
31 enter the winner’s circle: Madsen, 40.
32 “I wanted to escape”: Vilmorin, 77.
33 “The era of extravagant dressing”: Morand, L’Allure de Chanel, 43.
34 visiting her aunt Louise: Marcel Haedrich notes that Chanel purchased her straw hats at Galeries Lafayette. Haedrich, 52.
35 Coco’
s lifelong inability: Haedrich 45–46. According to Justine Picardie, “Several of [Chanel’s] friends believed that she did [become pregnant by Balsan].” Picardie, 53.
3. DESIGNING A NEW WORLD TOGETHER: COCO CHANEL AND ARTHUR EDWARD “BOY” CAPEL
1 “The boy was handsome”: Morand, L’Allure de Chanel, 34–38.
2 fictionalized it in his novel: Morand’s Irene was not a French fashion designer but a Greek banking mogul, a “modern young woman [who] went into business.” Paul Morand, Lewis and Irene, trans. H.B.V. [Vyvyan Beresford Holland] (New York: Boni and Liveright, 1925), 97.
3 their decadelong romance: Vilmorin, 82.
4 aristocratic polo circles: Although not a titled gentleman himself, Capel traveled in heady circles. As early as 1907, the society column of Le Figaro mentions Capel’s involvement in a polo-inspired charity ball, thrown by a committee consisting of Count and Countess Stanislas de Castellane; Grand Duchess Anastasia de Mecklenburg-Schwerin, the duc de Guiche (one of Capel’s oldest friends), and A. Capel. Le Figaro, March 7, 1907, 2. Among the earliest mentions of Capel’s name alongside Etienne Balsan’s is one in Le Figaro, August 22, 1909, which announces a polo match featuring Capel, Balsan, and Prince Radziwill.
5 “He gave birth to me”: Vilmorin, 83.
6 living comfortably on his investments: Daniel Hainaut and Martine Alison, “Société AJ Capel,” unpublished article, 2008. I thank Daniel Hainaut and Martine Alison for their generous help in researching the background of the Capel family.
7 on all paid sales: Handwritten entries, original Chanel logbooks. Conservatoire Chanel, Paris.
8 mistress, the beautiful actress: Charles-Roux, 190ff.
9 smooth-talking saleswoman: Rabaté left for good in 1912, when she began working for the famous Maison Reboux in Paris, eventually taking over as its director. Charles-Roux, 190n1.