Photo research diversion
I’ve been on-line quite a bit selecting illustrations for my e-book publications (coming up!).
It’s wonderfully easy to get lost in this process. Side-tracked, in fact. Here are some rather surprising discoveries, specifically having to do with the people in the life of Josephine’s daughter Hortense (the subject of my next novel).
I’ve always been fond of this portrait of Alexandre de Beauharnais, Josephine’s first husband, because he’s posed with his hand in his vest — exactly as her second husband Napoleon will be portrayed.
And her son Eugène, for that matter:
Coincidental? (I think not!)
The portrait that took me aback was this grim one of Alexandre, which I’d never seen before:
My suspicion has always been that Alexandre might have been bi-polar — something he might have passed onto Hortense, in fact. It’s only a hunch, but this portrait would certainly confirm that he was not a happy man.
