historically

[luxuryflower]

Everything takes its beginning one evening at the Théâtre des Variétes, in the spring of 1843.

Both Marguerite Gautier, who has risen to become the most infamous courtesan in Paris at the time, and Armand Duval, a modest lawyer by comparison, have turned up at the theatre in the company of friends in order to enjoy a ballet performance of Manon Lescaut. Armand has admired Marguerite from afar for a while and when his admiration becomes impossible to ignore, his friend Gaston Rieux – who already knows Marguerite well through his affair with her friend, Prudence Duvernoy, another courtesan – offers to finally introduce him to her.

Thus, before the performance (which offends Marguerite greatly, having to witness Manon’s infidelity towards her devoted lover and which moves Armand equally, as he sees himself possibly reflected in the fate of Des Grieux) takes its start, Armand is presented to Marguerite by Gaston. As is her habit, she decides to play pranks on him. When he bends his head to kiss the back of the hand that she offers him, Prudence is quick to extend her hand instead. And when he makes to take a seat next to Marguerite, one of her suitors swiftly moves the chair away from underneath him, causing him to tumble to the floor. In response to both pranks, his reaction is one of great dismay and affront – a reaction that intrigues Marguerite. Throughout the performance, her attention keeps returning to him from across the room. The result is that once the curtain falls, she extends an invitation for him to join her in her apartment along with Gaston, Prudence and Count N. An invitation that he gladly accepts.

Once in Marguerite’s apartment, a general state of merriness unfolds. Gaston and Prudence do not see themselves shy of being intimate in public, while Count N. desperately tries to catch Marguerite’s attention. Feeble attempts quickly shamed as he is denied even a seat next to her. All of Marguerite’s attention is on Armand. When the gramophone is brought out and Gaston and Prudence begin to dance, Armand and Marguerite slowly draw closer together, initiating a conversation which is soon interrupted by Count N. who whirls Marguerite into a waltz. Once more she refuses him, continuing the dance with Armand instead. Jealous beyond measure, Count N. drags her out of Armand’s arms and tries to resume his courtship, but the motion is so violent that it sends Marguerite into a violent coughing fit. She slaps Count N. and runs into her bedroom to be alone. While there, she goes to look at herself in the mirror – and faced only by the sight of her slowly worsening consumption, she falls into despair.

Armand follows, however. Despite Nanina’s, Marguerite’s maid’s efforts to keep Marguerite’s privacy intact. Finding Marguerite lying on the divan, Armand takes her hand. She quickly snaps out of her depression and tries to uphold her usual façade of coquettishness, but her constant coughing breaks the illusion and Armand isn’t swayed by it. Instead he throws himself at her feet, declaring his love for her – something which makes her laugh at first, but the earnestness with which the declaration was uttered also awakens an urge in her. A long-forgotten one. Or long-ignored. She tries to dissuade him, presents him with reality: That she is a courtesan with many lovers and if she were to take him for a lover as well, he would only be one of many. That, in any case, his love is only temporary and will last only until his family wants to see him married. That he doesn’t have the means necessary to uphold her livelihood. She tells him all of this, honestly and openly – and yet, Armand doesn’t give up on his claims of true devotion. In the end, Marguerite decides to use the final trump card. She reminds him that she is ill, that she is dying and will not live long. As if to prove it, a violent coughing fit shakes her body again. Armand’s response is to kiss her. Uncaring of the possible consequences. At this moment, everything changes for Marguerite. This young man who has no money has yet made her feel more alive than any one of the richest men that she has known as a courtesan. Knowing well that all her logical reasons still apply, Marguerite decides to follow her heart with caution. She will become Armand’s mistress, but only on the condition that she can continue her life as before and, even more importantly, that he doesn’t hold her lifestyle against her. As with her invitation earlier that evening, Armand accepts without question.

What comes after is a string of parties and balls where Marguerite dances with her many suitors until her feet are sore. Where she adorns herself with the Duke’s (her richest and most influential lover, serving as her patron) diamonds and even accepts a valuable bracelet from Count N., although her gratitude to him is shown with another of her many pranks, cruel as it may be to hide from him in the crowd. Yes, Marguerite’s life continues much as it has always done, with the one exception that in between each social event, she meets with Armand and lives, high on passion.

Eventually, in order to accommodate her health, the Duke rents a house in the countryside and brings Marguerite with him, to enjoy the peace and quiet that is to be found there, in a village that undoubtedly presents a scenery much alike the one from which she originated. Unbeknownst to him, however - as soon as he turns his back on her and returns to Paris, Marguerite invites all her friends and Armand amongst them to leech off of his benevolence, bringing her former lifestyle out into the fields surrounding Bougival. There, one fine day, the Duke finds them, playing their favourite games. Marguerite in Armand's arms, the very image of her loose morals, if not an image of her true love. He forces her to finally make a choice, to choose him and his diamonds or to choose Armand and with him, a definite lack of riches. The woman, Marguerite, not the courtesan makes that final decision. She chooses Armand, her lover, her love. Left behind by the Duke and by their acquaintances, bared suddenly to the core, the two bask in their genuine love for each other. Perhaps despite, perhaps because every of their unfortunate circumstances, everything seems idyllic. Like perfection.

A perfection shattered when one day Armand's father shows up at the door, insisting on seeing Marguerite. Allowing him an audience, they meet each other as rivals to Armand's alliance and his father angrily, desperately attempts to threaten Marguerite to end her relationship with Armand, a relationship that is destroying his image and with it, the image of his family. His innocent little sister's chances of striking a good match, if not (least of all) Armand's own chances of doing the same. Marguerite faces the implied accusations with strong pleas as to the earnestness of her love and devotion for Armand, begs his father to believe her when she says that she loves him more than her own life. It is this argument that he turns against her, then - asks her to let Armand go, in the name of her love for him. To give him the opportunity of a normal life. Defeated, Marguerite agrees to do so and gratefully, Armand's father leaves her with the recognition that he believes in her pure love for his son.

Before Armand can return from his outing, Marguerite has had Nanina pack her belongings, everything that they have shared, but which was originally hers and with that, she returns to Paris. All she leaves behind for Armand being a brief note, telling him that she desires the lifestyle he can't give her and will now seek out the man who can. As such, once back in Paris, she begs the Duke for forgiveness and upon receiving his blessing, resumes her old life - as the courtesan who doesn't entertain any lover (besides the Duke) unless he doesn't stay beyond one night. As the courtesan who doesn't love, who doesn't believe herself worthy.

As the woman who has been once bitten, finding herself twice shy.