Choice of Adjectives- Remembering Empress Sisi

"I am a seagull, of no land, I call no shore my home, I am bound to no place, I fly from wave to wave.

Empress Elisabeth of Austria

If you have been to Vienna, it is difficult to miss Empress Elisabeth or Sisi, as she is often called. From chocolate boxes to posters and from museum tickets to souvenir shops – she is everywhere. A true popstar of her time, the biggest icon of Austrian Royal family, compared with Lady Di by biographers, subject of novels and movies- she is presented as a glamourous but depressed queen.  The Hofberg palace has a full museum dedicated to her – displaying her personal articles, her chamber, her letters, and her famous dresses. It was first in this museum that I read her poetry. It is sad that with so much emphasis on her doll like persona of a fairytale princess, her other remarkable characteristics of being a poet, an avid traveller, reader and an intellectual – a woman very aware of her socio-political situation, are never highlighted. Her concern for women suffering in lunatic asylums of Europe of her time, is often ridiculed and so is her free spirit and constant demand for privacy even as an Empress of Europe’s biggest empire of that time. Her media avatars are either of innocent young girl trapped in court politics or of a cold-hearted vain woman obsessed with physical beauty. In fact, her insistence for physical exercise by installing a gym in every palace she lived in, is also depicted as her unreal desire to be ageless. In today’s vocabulary, she would be a health enthusiast, a fitness icon even.

 I was suddenly reminded of this as I was watching a DW documentary - Sisi’s Legacy 

 this morning and I noticed something. In this documentary as well as in numerous articles written about Sisi or the TV series or movies based on her, the choice of adjectives is very problematic. The documentary calls her eccentric, narcissistic, obsessed with ageless beauty, a mother who neglected her children, a woman who refused to stay on with her husband and finally someone who was reckless enough to get assassinated. She is also guardedly blamed for taking her first daughter on travel with her causing her death. The commentary is quite easy to the fact that she was fifteen when she was made empress, sixteen when she was a mother and that she was unaccustomed to the ways of the most proper and stifling court of whole of Europe.

Oh swallow, give me your quick wings

And take me with you to distant countries.

I'll be happy to break the chains that hold me

And to break the bars of my prison ...

If I could fly with you

Through the blue eternity of heaven

How I would make thank you with all my being

The Goddess that men call freedom!

-                                                                                                                                                --  Empress Elisabeth (1856)

 

Last year another movie titled ‘Corsage’ came in European theatres. Once again , Sisi is the unhappy Royal who is hysterical and irresponsible. Forcing modern feminist sensibilities on her is hardly doing any justice. Most of her biographers are sympathetic towards the shy, young girl, miserable at court, but then they start to chide Sisi for her selfishness in disregarding her husband's concerns, neglecting her duties, feigning illness etc. While there may be some truth in all these – the contemporary portrayals for her husband and son are not this harsh despite their very questionable personal and public conduct.Neither there is any probe in why an Empress had to feign illness or avoid public scrutiny ? Even in this documentary, there is no judgement of Franz Joseph for subjecting his son for very cruel “physical and psychological hardening” (which eventually was put to stop by ‘irresponsible’ mother Sisi) but Sisi is repeatedly judged for leaving her children behind for her travels (‘on State Expense’) or for not staying in the court. Her son Rudolf, similarly,  is painted as a man ahead of his time in his views- while underplaying the fact that he neglected his wife and daughter, had series of affairs , got a STD due to his visits to brothels  and killed his mistress before committing suicide. Sisi, however is judged even for smoking, wearing black after the death of her son or refusing to get photographed.  

My friend Zehra recently wrote on Facebook how women are accused of not knowing their mind, though the reality is that most of the times, they do know exactly what they want. The problem comes in acceptance from community and family on ‘what’ women want. Our family and society are yet to mainstream the true wishes of women and are very quick in judging them for their conduct and desires with wrong set of adjectives. Even in popular media, for every portrayal of a woman who speaks her mind there are ten where the stereotypical loving wife, mother and the sacrificing woman image is reinforced. It is often the fear of being judged, labelled as ‘difficult’ that makes women hesitant and unclear in expressing their mind.  When I see women politicians and actresses being shut down from serious discussions and being judged so unfairly and blatantly on their appearances, accessories, and private lives, I wonder how we blame women in families to be shy in expressing their true wishes and opinions? It is a bane of our times that at times in ordinary houses people are willing to take steps in the right directions yet our system, our organisations and even our courts paint it the other way. It is still rare in communities and public forums to allow women space to express themselves freely. to shake off the stereotype and not being  subjected to scrutiny and judgment. From Empress Sisi to Mahua Moitra and  from mythical Draupadi to Sunny Leone – it is a continued stream of judgement  and use of negative adjectives that colour the narrative of what women want.