Julia > Recent Status Updates

Team Black! 🔥

I already am enjoying the book’s depiction of the Dance of Dragons over the show.

I really appreciate the character of Gerty Farish, and the compassion she bestows Lily despite having good reason not to.

It’s interesting how Wharton while mostly sticking to her protagonists pov gives glimpses into other characters’ povs in an almost omniscient narrator type.

Thank the Gods I’m almost done!

Finally got to the independence of the Congo but nothing on how Elisabeth felt about it. I would have liked to have learned about her perspective.

A whole chapter dedicated to a cellist named Casal that Elisabeth was good friends with only brief mentions of her from time to time. But I’d rather know more about Elisabeth herself.

I’m not always liking the way this biography is written.

I’m nearly three quarters through now and finally got a chapter on Elisabeth’s work saving hundreds of Jews during the Holocaust but sadly only a few pages are dedicated to it.

Her husband has died now, it’s very tragic but it was nice to see she recovered from the grief and depression.

I remain frustrated with how the issue of the Congo was handled. Reform without decolonization is just more colonization.

Joe was eccentric to say the least.

It’s like watching a train wreck I can’t look away from.

I’m finding that Elisabeth was a deeply intelligent and compassionate woman, while still being guilty of the Western sins of her time. I am fascinated by how cleverly she navigated her position as queen to see reforms built in Belgium. But also at tiem frustrated that more was not done, particularly regarding the native peoples of the Congo.

Elisabeth supported suffrage before it became legal in Belgium?! That’s quite something for a Queen to publicaly support in that time!

Finally we get some focus on Elisabeth during WWI, and she is a shining light.

I feel like I’m getting more history of Belgium rather than getting to know Elisabeth of Bavaria so far.

Leopold II was a monster.

Learning about the Belgian Congo scandal was unexpected.