The Book of the Courtesans

by Susan Griffin

  The resulting alliance was more than practical. Economic change almost always carries with it, for better or worse, a vision. The locus of meaning shifts. New avenues of thought as well as transaction suddenly appear. In the best of these changes, life seems revitalized. And wherever there is new life, there is also eros. The energy between Imperia and Chigi, two giants of pleasure and profit, would have been as palpable as was the precise and detailed reflection they found in each other.

  Business is as much about relationship as it is mathematics. They both knew how intimately conviviality and dividend are related. They understood that trust and pleasure engender largesse, that creating a mood of abundance encourages abundance. Chigi was famous for the night that he served his guests dinner on gold and silver plates. Arranging the festivities in a loggia that faced the Tiber, after the dinner was completed, the banker threw his own plate into the water and encouraged his guests to do the same. This was not only a theatrical gesture, it was in itself a drama, symbolic of the liberation from old orders that Chigi and his guests were enjoying.

  Nevertheless, both Chigi and Imperia knew that certain earthly laws must still be obeyed. The priceless plates were retrieved the next day from a net Chigi had hidden in the river earlier. Like her protector, though she gave off an air of careless extravagance, Imperia thought of the future, too. It was no doubt at her insistence that Chigi acknowledged Margherita as his daughter, and most probably because of Chigi’s influence at the Vatican, Pope Leo X legitimized her birth. Eventually she married into the ducal family of Carafa.

  Near the end of Imperia’s life, once again with Chigi’s help, she was able to ensure that her first daughter, Lucrezia, was also married. Despite the unwritten law that whenever a courtesan falls in love, it is at her own peril, Imperia had fallen in love with a man named Angelo del Bufalo. Her admiration was understandable. He was sophisticated, handsome, socially graceful, with an attractively wild streak that did not prevent him from being well respected. But the liaison would prove her downfall. Bufalo, who was married, began to favor another mistress. Imperia felt him pull away from her by degrees, before finally, after telling her that he had fallen out of love with her, he ended the affair. She drank poison.

  Her death would be agonizing. But over the several days that she was still alive, she wrote the will that left her property to her first daughter, Lucrezia. Appointing Chigi her executor, as her dying wish she extracted from him the promise that he find a husband for Lucrezia. Thus, ten months after Imperia’s death, her first daughter was wedded to a spice merchant from Chigi’s native Siena. In the light of the miraculous nature of Imperia’ s last accomplishment, the salvation of her daughter, the name of the groom, Archangelo Colonna, was suitable. And even more miraculously for this period of history so unfavorable to women, the arrangement proved more than practical. Apparently this newly married couple fell in love with each other.

  Her Pink Rabbits

  Still one more aspect of the courtesans’ brilliance must be mentioned here. They were natural mimics. Though their ability to act did not always translate well to the theatre, off the stage, in what is called real life, they were talented performers. Usually born to either poor or middle-class families, not only did they have to have cheek to travel in upper-class circles, they also had to be able to imitate the manners of upper- class ladies. A performance, we might add, which since in some circumstances they were required to pretend they were not courtesans, while in others they were expected to make it clear that they were, they had to turn off and on at will.

  As we have already noted, Emilienne d’Alençon was one of the most celebrated among grandes cocottes of the Belle Epoque. Along with Liane de Pougy and La Belle Otero, she was part of a popular trio known in Paris as le Grand Trois. Before her rise to fame she had actually studied acting at the Conservatoire. But probably because classical French drama hardly suited her, she only lasted for one year. The circus was more her metier. And it was this career that established her. Eventually, she could count the sons of more than one aristocratic family among her lovers. In turn, she was among the many lovers of King Leopold II of Belgium. In this company there were times when she had to appear well bred even if part of her attraction was that she was not. For her brief visit to Britain, she created an entirely fictitious role for herself as the comtesse de Beaumanoir (translated as the “Countess House Beautiful”). She made a great impression as this personage, temporarily adopting what Cornelia Otis Skinner called “ crooked little-finger refinement.” That she spoke no English doubtless made her even more admirable.

  But by far her greatest performance debuted at the Cirque d’Eté, before eventually she brought it to the Folies-Bergère, in which ostensibly she simply played herself. The popular act was built around a troupe of rabbits, which she had dyed shocking pink and outfitted with paper ruffles. Dressed in this way, the rabbits were almost like accessories to their mistress. Blond, with a rosy, dimpled complexion, she was fond of wearing pink taffeta with lace trimming. The writer Jean Lorrain describes her as resembling raspberry ice. What she did with the rabbits is unclear from this distance, though one can easily imagine that they were made to jump through hoops at her bidding. The whole color-coordinated effect must have been hilarious.

  The humor was not only intended but the result of several comedic abilities, which, along with the all-important virtue or timing, included mimicry. In this case, though, what d’Alençon mirrored so brilliantly was an idea instead of a reality. Molding herself to a classic type in the repertoire of feminine roles, she played the dumb blonde with clever dexterity. Paradoxically, it takes more than average intelligence to play the part of a bimbo. Imitating life is one thing, but giving lifeblood to a fantasy is quite another.

  Though on one level the act must have been charmingly silly, that there would have been a more complex side becomes evident when one observes any modern comedienne adept at playing this type. Whenever Gracie Allen, Marilyn Monroe, Elaine May, or Goldie Hawn has played an empty-headed woman, as with the invisible wires that hold up a marionette, a quality of intelligence can be felt beneath the masquerade, which gives the performance a subversive meaning, almost opposite to the picture officially presented. That at times, considering the unequal power women have been given, they cannily pretend to be stupid in order to manipulate men is the double entendre of such performances at which everyone, men and women alike, are invited to laugh.

  Along the lines of this double meaning, clearly d’Alençon’s act was making a comic allusion to the power that courtesans had to commandeer favors from their wealthy lovers. That the rabbits, belonging as they do to a species known for reproductive prowess, seemed eager to please their mistress was part of the appeal. Emerging from the stereotype of a naive young woman, foolish enough to play with rabbits, an entirely different story was told by these obedient animals, tamed and collared by their mistress.

  NINON DE LENCLOS

  Seduction

  (THE FOURTH EROTIC STATION)

  AS THE STORY is told, the young man could not fathom why everyone raved about Ninon de Lenclos. Her fabled powers of seduction would have no effect on him, he boasted to a friend.

  “What appeal can a woman of her age possibly have?” he asked.

  So it was that his friend, who had been a lover of Ninon, proposed a wager, betting that his friend would not be able to resist her charms.

  Ninon, who was delighted to accept the challenge, agreed to a meeting. And of course despite his confidence, once ushered into the courtesan’s presence, the young man was disarmed. What was it that she did? Of course we can only surmise what took place between them, but there is good reason to believe that she began by taking an interest in him. Where were you raised? she probably asked. What beautiful boots you are wearing! she might have said. Or, have you seen the latest performance at the Comédie-Française; what did you think of it? To all his responses, giving him the feeling that she is fascinated.

  But if w
e are to understand the secret of this process, we must take another look. If the interest she focuses on him has an immediate effect, it is because she is not feigning fascination. She is rather, from long habit, studying him closely, with the same intense intelligence she has always turned toward life. And though he has not fallen yet, it is easy to believe that this attention makes him puff his feathers. Why not, perhaps he says to himself, tell his friends one day that the famous Ninon found him very interesting, even though she left him cold.

  He begins then to regale her with his accomplishments, trying to reveal everything he believes to be wonderful about himself. She does not stop him. Though there may be a slightly indulgent smile on her face, she listens quietly to everything he says, interrupting only to ask more questions, until finally his bragging begins to slow down of its own accord. There must be something profoundly unnerving to him in the serenity of her composure. In the wake of it he starts, if only slightly, to experience a moment of self-awareness. Perhaps he has gone on about himself a bit too much.

  It is with this brief self-reflection, then, that the most subtle expression of embarrassment passes quickly over his face. And though most people would never have seen it, Ninon does. Her smile grows just a bit more indulgent, and seeing that, he feels his embarrassment even more acutely, which in turn causes her to emit a very discreet laugh. The process continues, as with Heisenberg’s principle of uncertainty, perception affecting events, in this case intensifying the young man’s feelings.

  Even if he does not know it, he is already caught. She does not ridicule him. Rather, her interest grows. She is intrigued by what she sees now—not simply an arrogant young man but one in whom intelligence, arrogance, and humility, even a tender vulnerability, are freely mixed. Her response is neither unkind nor maternal. Instead, she allows herself to be touched as well as intrigued. It must have been very early in her life that she realized the way to charm a man is to find him charming. Yet it is not his braggadocio she responds to, but the part of himself he has always tried to hide.

  Now, since she makes no effort to conceal the fact that she finds him charming, and since no one else has cared to see what he concealed, much less responded so well, he begins to feel the full force of her fabled seductiveness.

  The end of the story, repeated now for over three hundred years, is that the young man lost his bet. Ninon was several years older when the young Abbe Gedolyn began to pursue her with an unmistakable ardor. She put him off for a while and when finally she agreed to be his lover she said he would have to wait for one month and a day. He agreed eagerly, counting the hours until the appointed time. When the day arrived, she was good for her word. Happy in her arms at last, he asked her why she had made him wait for exactly a month and a day.

  “Because today is my birthday,” she answered, “and I wanted to prove to myself that at the age of seventy, I am still capable of entertaining a lover.”

  MARION DAVIES

  Chapter Five

  Gaiety (or Joie de Vivre)

  Kiss the joy as it flies.

  —WILLIAM BLAKE

  THE CAPACITY TO take pleasure in life is no less a virtue than any other. Joy is not as simple as it appears. There are those who, whether out of fear or judgment, so habitually resist the feeling that after a while they lose the knack of being pleased altogether. Others, mistaking mastery for pleasure, prefer conquest to delight and never really taste the spoils of their efforts. There is an art to enjoying life, to feeling desire and receiving what comes, to savoring every detail, down to the finest points, of each taste, sensation, or moment that happens by will or by chance to appear. The experience requires a subtle courage. Delight, jubilance, elation can throw you off balance, upsetting the established order of the day (or, as is more often the case, the night). And because almost all forms of joy are fleeting, pleasure must eventually lead to loss, no matter how small— a loss that brings with it the certain knowledge that everything passes.

  Abstinence and greed alike provide the means to avoid this knowledge. By shunning pleasure, the loss of it can be avoided. Aesop’s fable of the Ant and the Cricket is one of the more abiding stories regarding abstinence we have been given. It is a cautionary tale that warns us against the fate of the hungry cricket, who sang and danced all summer rather than gathering food as the ant did. Yet, read closely, the story conceals another warning, too. The abstemious ant lacks generosity. When the cricket asks for food from his industrious neighbor, the ant sardonically suggests that he just keep dancing. There is more than a little jealousy in this response, though in retrospect we can feel some sympathy for him. All summer his attention has been on the winter. But the sight of the cricket must have reminded the poor ant how little he enjoyed the summer.

  Aesop himself was not immune to enjoyment. Centuries ago, he supported the courtesan Rhodopsis. And La Fontaine, the man who, in the seventeenth century, transformed Aesop’s tales into French poetry, was present more than once when Ninon entertained her guests by playing the lute. He must have been transfixed like everyone else. Despite the moral of the tale, his appreciation of music is evident in the beautiful rhymes and rhythms of his telling.

  Of course, the story is correct in one sense. The existence of greed alone tells us that the indulgence of pleasure does not always lead to a pleasing end. Yet, though greed seems to be going in the opposite direction to abstinence, it springs from a similar motive. The accumulation of whatever is pleasurable in far greater quantities than can actually be enjoyed creates the illusion that one has escaped the transitory nature of pleasure. The rub is that, as with a gluttony so exaggerated it causes illness, pleasure itself will be sacrificed in the bargain. What is crucial is the intent.

  When pleasure itself is the primary motive, excess has a far different effect. In My Apprenticeships, Colette describes the experience of taking a meal at Caroline Otero’s house on the rue Fortuny. “I have always enjoyed food,” she wrote of her taste for hearty meals, “but what was my appetite compared with Lina’s.” It makes a certain sense that Otero would have a famous appetite. She had been close to starvation many times in her childhood. There is perhaps a certain egalitarian justice in the fact that the women most famous for enjoying pleasure often came from miserable circumstances. Suffering can sharpen appreciation. Knowing that it was useless to worry about how she might be able to eat in the future, even as a child Otero learned to focus her undivided attention on the pleasures of each meal.

  A robust dinner of sausages and beef and chicken was served, which both women consumed with gusto. But that Otero was by far the better eater was made abundantly clear. She emptied her plate four or five times. Still, Colette tells us that Otero enjoyed every bite, emanating a mood of “gentle bliss, an air of happy innocence,” as she ate, “her teeth, her eyes, her glossy lips” shining “like a girl’s.” She had not overeaten. After finishing with a strawberry ice, she immediately jumped up from the table, and grasping a pair of castanets, began to dance with a full and intense energy, another pleasure, one that, as Colette writes, “was born of a true passion for rhythm and music.” It is fitting that such an evening should end in dance. That pleasure requires an intimate self-knowledge and a refined perception of desire, in turn necessitates that we be present to each moment, bringing to it the full awareness that life is continually moving.

  As Colette tells us, it was a joy to see Otero dance. Whenever great pleasure is had, a secondary pleasure arises from being in the presence of the banquet. Pleasure begets pleasure. Of its very nature, joy radiates outward, touching everyone who happens to be in the vicinity where it is had. Accordingly, the capacity to receive pleasure has a magnetic appeal. Wherever a particularly joyous person goes, conviviality is born, excitement is generated, creativity flourishes, and crowds assemble.

  There was a reason why Païva was called “the Queen of Paris” or why later Liane de Pougy was known in France as “our national courtesan.” The great courtesans were like queen bees around wh
om countless social worlds developed like so many intricate honeycombs. Whether during the Renaissance or the period of the Enlightenment; the Second Empire, the Regency, the Gay Nineties, the Belle Epoque, the Roaring Twenties; in Paris or Rome, Venice, London, New York, or Hollywood; at balls and parties, salons and cafés, the opera and the theatre, remarkable worlds were woven of wealthy men and aristocrats, artists and writers, around the presence of a few women, who provided an essential and catalytic ingredient to the mysterious alchemy: their gaiety.

  Sunset Boulevard

  It was a big gay party, every bit of it.—Marion Davies, The Times We Had

  In the midst of the Roaring Twenties, among the most popular parties in Hollywood were those thrown by Marion Davies at a house just above Sunset Boulevard, at 1700 Lexington Road. The white stucco mansion with a large and elegant swimming pool was bought for her by William Randolph Hearst. Davies had been his mistress for several years. Hearst, who was married at the time to another showgirl, met her when she was performing in the Ziegfeld Follies.

  In the history of courtesans, the promotion from showgirl to kept woman was a common event. Yet, as with Coco Chanel, Marion was not considered a courtesan. By the Roaring Twenties—the age of the flapper—the institution was fading. The liberties that courtesans had enjoyed exclusively were being disseminated. Hence a tradition once built on the premise that proper women’ s lives were more restricted slowly came to an end. But the lineage of the great courtesans had clearly passed on to the next generation. The art of pleasure was continued with virtuosity by the good-time girl.