“Under her petticoats, under her damp stockings, Lucretia feels the muscles of her legs contract as if to tell her to run, to scamper. » What Lucrezia de Medici, 16 years old in the year 1561, wants to flee is her husband, Duke Alfonso d’Este. Because tonight, he decided to kill her. This certainty is the starting point of the latest novel by Irish writer Maggie O’Farrell, who notably distinguished herself with Hamnet (Belfond, 2020), in which she brings to life the son of William Shakespeare, who died at 11 years old. With The Wedding Portrait, she once again captures the destiny of a being who vanished in the turmoil of the Renaissance. Little is known about the existence of Lucretia de Medici, except that she died the year she was 16, carried away by a mysterious illness. A rumor circulated: that of a poisoning committed by her husband, to punish the young woman, married at 13, never pregnant, for infertility probably coming from him – despite three marriages, this man did not father the least heir.
Against male domination. Maggie O’Farrell interweaves the story of the night of terror, when threatened Lucrezia seeks to escape death, with that of the time of childhood and adolescence. The author’s voluptuous writing, superbly translated, makes this life a dark, thrilling fresco, in which beats a heart in revolt against male domination. The most powerful scene in the text is the meeting between Lucretia as a child and a tigress kept in captivity by her father in the basement of his castle. Caressing the beast without being bitten, she detects in herself an animal part which will be her guide in a world where everyone advances masked. The animal metaphor is omnipresent in the text, whose characters become wild, dangerous, peaceful or fantastic creatures. “There is something in her, […] a kind of insolence. I feel her, sometimes, when I look at her, as if an animal was living behind her eyes,” judges the murderous duke while observing his very young wife. Driven by his flair and his instinct, this marvelous paper creature takes us alongside him in his nervous race to survive, galloping between the pages of a great historical novel with the air of a twilight tale§
“The Wedding Portrait”, by Maggie O’Farrell, translated from English (Ireland) by Sarah Tardy (Belfond, 411 p., €23.50).
“His fingers tighten on the edge of his plate. The certainty that he harbors the plan to see her die is like a presence next to her, a bird of prey with dark plumage resting on the arm of her chair. »
