Yet by the time of her execution 23 years later, she was reviled. The frivolous, high-spirited tomboy who arrived at Versailles at age 14 was quickly embraced by her subjects. With the possible exception of the Corsican-born Napoleon, another outsider who overstayed his welcome, no one haunts French history like the Hapsburg princess. Less than a decade after the theater's inauguration in 1780, the curtain would come crashing down on the French monarchy and its Austrian-born queen, who seemed to grow in moral stature as she approached the guillotine. But I had to admit that there is a poignancy about the playhouse and its fantasy world. I did not commune with Marie Antoinette's ghost, as some claim to have done. Marie condemned by the Revolutionary Tribunal It's a state of grace, an aura you sense-even after 40 years here.' 'You're thinking about other things, then all of a sudden, you're totally surprised.

'From time to time, you have to visit a spot like the theater when there's no one else around to give the place a chance to trigger an emotional reaction,' he said. On the way out, Baulez, who has worked at the former royal palace for four decades, locked the gate with a heavy iron key. Have a good, long look,' said Christian Baulez, Versailles' chief conservator. The painted, original backdrop depicts a rustic farmhouse hearth, and I can just imagine the young queen reveling in her role as a shepherdess while her witty friends and dull husband, French king Louis XVI, applaud politely.Īt the time I was there, the theater was closed to most visitors (it is now open to the public from April 1 through October 31), and I wanted to take full advantage of my access. Late September sunlight filters onto the blue velvet furnishings of the jewel-box theater built for Marie Antoinette at Versailles.

Marie Antoinette by Stefan Zweig