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As promised, the next instalment of #QueerHistoryMonday - today is all about The Countess aka Pauline aka Arthur W aka Arthur Berloget, a Parisian singer in the 1850s/60s. Here& #39;s a picture she drew of herself at her toilette in 1874.
When talking about The Countess we immediately run into one of the main problems of queer history: which name, pronouns and gender do you use? The Countess was assigned male at birth, which has left the vast majority of historians talking about her as & #39;him& #39; and & #39;a man& #39;.
However, the reason we know about The Countess is because of the autobiography she left us: "The Secret Confessions of a Parisian: The Countess, 1850-1871", written in 1874 and finally published in 1895. In it she describes her joy in living as a woman, how The Countess...
...was the name bestowed upon her in a moving ceremony by her fellow & #39;filles& #39; and tribade sisters (before that she had been Pauline for a number of years), and the sadness it caused her to have to revert to being & #39;a man& #39; for a stint in the army and then later in prison.
So it seems only right to respect her own self-knowledge, let alone her life experience, and use & #39;she& #39; and & #39;The Countess& #39;.
The "Confessions" are an amazing document, not only because of what they contain, but the authority with which they are written, and the author& #39;s background
The "Confessions" are an amazing document, not only because of what they contain, but the authority with which they are written, and the author& #39;s background
The Countess was born into a working class Parisian home, and transitioned in her teens, becoming the kept woman of a member of the nobility. She then became a café-concert singer, a courtesan, an army deserter and then a robber, which led to the prison sentence.
She was something of a dilettante artist throughout her life, and her autobiography is illustrated by her own drawings. Below is her depiction of her fellow & #39;fille& #39; & #39;La Charles& #39;:
The Countess left behind the most incredible record of queer Parisian life in the mid 19th century. To cherry-pick just a few of the wonderful insights found within: The Countess came out to her mother and was supported and cherished as a daughter; the tribades...
...and the & #39;filles& #39; or & #39;mignons& #39; are described as a family, and are depicted as providing mutual support (and some amazing champagne-drenched parties), and it was possible (certainly in The Countess& #39;s case) for a woman assigned male at birth to have a successful performing career
The theatre (whether the popular café-cons or the other forms of Parisian theatre) was a popular place for filles/mignons, tribades, sapphists, and garçons (masculine queer men) to cruise, and also to hero worship their favourites on stage.
Throughout her work, The Countess makes clear distinctions between different groups of queer people: those who experience same sex attraction and are very much in line with their assigned at birth gender, and those who & #39;want to be& #39;/live as the other gender.
In her milieu, these groups came together as friends and lovers, though her closest friendships are describes as being with fellow filles, her & #39;sister& #39; tribades, and with cis women sex workers who supported her, helped her with her & #39;transformation& #39; and showed her the ropes.
Here& #39;s The Countess& #39;s picture of a typical tribade - she notes that many don& #39;t pass as men due to their "lovely curves", but one - "B" - "adopted men& #39;s clothes and looked ravishing in them. Even men were fooled, and women went wild over her."
While "The Confessions" reflect some of the common literary/sexological mores of the era - "why am I like this?" "Oh, my life of voluptuous sin" etc. - they have a glorious defiant tone along with that, and some very tender moments.
If you& #39;d like to read them in their entirety, you can find them in "Queer Lives: Men& #39;s Autobiographies from Nineteenth Century France" (2008). This book is a wealth of source material, but presented throughout in a disappointingly (to my mind erroneously) cisnormative way.
So, instead, I& #39;ll leave the final words to the Countess herself, radiant in the success of her transition, 180 years ago:
"I, who had so desired to be a girl, have triumphed over natural law."
#QueerHistoryMonday
"I, who had so desired to be a girl, have triumphed over natural law."
#QueerHistoryMonday
