The Congress Dances

by Susan Mary Alsop

Few historic occasions lend themselves more naturally to petticoat history than the 1815 Congress of Vienna, where Tsar Alexander I, Austria's Metternich, Britain's Castlereagh & France's Talleyrand assembled to reconstruct Europe after the upheavals of the French Revolution & the Napoleonic era--where, notoriously, three international beauties--Dorothea de Talleyrand-Perigord, her sister Wilhelmina Sagan & Catherine Bragation--played prominent roles. Alsop (Lady Sackville, Yankees at the Court) sets the scene over-elaborately but animatedly: the life, character, domestic & diplomatic intrigues of all concerned; the victors' gala entrance into Paris; the truculent, anticlimactic return of Louis XVIII; Alexander's unfortunate visit to England. She's perfectly clear about what was involved--"the complex problem of establishing what Castlereagh called 'a real & permanent balance of power'"--&, in the course of the Congress, she shows how conflicts of interest (between Castlereagh's desire to strenghten the center against east & west & Talleyrand's fear of a strong Prussia, between Metternich & the tsar on Poland) threatened a new war. But her real subject is "the bizarre interplay between the serious & the frivolous": Metternich's consuming passion for fickle Wilhelmina Sagan (who contemptuously let Alexander call at M's accustomed hour), Alexander's premiere liaison with Catherine Bragation (who occupied half the same house, whose daughter was Metternich's child), Talleyrand's troubling new infatuation with Catherine, his niece-by-marriage & youngest daughter of his longtime mistress, the Duchess of Courland. (On the Courlands generally, this is far superior to Roslaynd C. Pflaum's By Influence & Desire, p349) If this weren't more than enough, Alsop not only recaps events thru Napoleon's return from Elba & the aftermath of those 100 Days, she tells what-happened-after to the three ladies--down to the culinary & literary particulars (Careme's "salade Bragation" & "sauce Bragation," Balzac's "La belle Foedora, la femme de monde") of Princess Bragation's flamboyant Paris heyday. The last scene is her pitiful final meeting--thru his granddaughter's eyes--with Metternich. Head-spinning entertainment for readers of (tasteful) costume fiction.--Kirkus (edited)

Genres: History, 19th Century

240 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1984

About the author

From Wikipedia:

Susan Mary Alsop (née Jay; June 19, 1918 – August 18, 2004) was an American writer and socialite active in Washington, D.C., political circles. She was the wife of columnist Joseph Alsop and a descendant of founding father John Jay. Her Georgetown home hosted dignitaries and publishers during the 1960s and 1970s ranging from John F. Kennedy, Phil Graham, Katharine Graham, and Isaiah Berlin, earning her the nickname "the grand dame of Washington society."[1][2]

Reviews

[Krista · Rating 4 out of 5]

An intimate portrait of the major players attending the Congress of Vienna - Castlereagh, Metternich, and Talleyrand - as well as the women in their lives. Great for pairing with Teresa Grant's novels.

[Rosalia Tenorio-Martínez · Rating 4 out of 5]

Qué interesantes todas las intrigas dentro de ese congreso en el que las naciones más poderosas como Reino Unido, Rusia, Austria y Francia se repartían Europa, después de haber derrotado a Napoleón.
En el libro se destaca que las discusiones serias siempre se complementaban con la frivolidad, como las incontables fiestas en las que derrochaban grandes cantidades de dinero.
También se destaca el papel tan relevante que tuvieron tres mujeres: Wilhelmina von Sagan (amante de Metternich, a quien le fue infiel con muchos otros durante el congreso), Dorothea de Talleyrand (sobrina política de un ministro del mismo apellido) y Catherine Bagration (también amante de Metternich, con quien tuvo una hija no reconocida).
Las partes mejores son las que retoman información de la correspondencia de estas personas.

[Erik Graff · Rating 3 out of 5]

Light, but dense, review of the Congress of Vienna which pays as much, or more, attention to the social atmosphere as it does to the history. Kinda makes one sigh for a revolution...

[OSCAR · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fue una obra que en realidad habló del ambiente de cotilleo, de amoríos y alianzas inestables tras bambalinas, en torno al framoso Congreso de Viena, que determinó los destinos de Europa durante un siglo, después de la caída y derrota del gran corso, Napoleón Bonaparte. Retrató la autora el talante, ligerezas y fortalezas de los prohombres que ejercieron su influjo para detener lo incontenible: la Revolución francesa y sus ramifaciones: nacionalismo, anarquismo, protosocialismo.

El imaginar la procesión de reyes, nuncios, personalidades selectas y aristócratas arruinados es una grata sensación para el lector. Uno, después de leer este libro, se maravilla de que en un medio tan vanal se haya podido concertar una gran Pax.

¡Sumamente recomendable!

[Yooperprof · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very uneven, unfortunately. Alsop would have benefitted from a strong editor. The book lacks narrative focus, a clearly stated "purpose." Really, if this book were written today, I'm sure the author would have been much more pointed in her comments about the sad misplacement of talents which deprived the world of some potentially brilliant leaders, merely because they were women.

[Deena · Rating 2 out of 5]

From an academic point of view, this book is really flawed. The author tries but fails to prove that the women who were at the Congress as wives or consorts of the diplomats had a measurable role in the settlements. Instead, this book is the worst sort of "women's history" - insisting on a significance that didn't exist. Feh.