NATALIE CLIFFORD BARNEY and THE COURTESAN LIANE DE POUGY WHO OUTED HER IN A PUBLISHED BOOK

Though as a very young woman circa 1898, Natalie Clifford Barney had already had sexual encounters with other women before this, it was a married model named Carmen Rossi who turned her into an "exquisite lover." She was inspired to become a 'poet of love' for there was something of the great romantic in her at the time and she wished to seduce a women's mind, body and soul. Carmen and Natalie went around Paris having a good time, attending both low and high entertainment, and one of the highs was witnessing and participating in the rides around the Bois de Boulogne, where the rich especially showed off their gorgeous carriages, horses, and wore the latest fashions. One day while Natalie was making the round herself with a male companion, she sighted Liane de Pougy in that procession and was immediately intrigued. Her friend told her Liane was "just a courtesan.'" She might not have known what that meant at the time and when she did understand she did not like the idea.

Around this time Natalie began to further define her sexuality and the role she would play in seductions. She embraced her lesbianism and also realized that she could not be faithful to just one woman, that she craved variety. She became a seductress and began to proposition women she found attractive, even approaching strangers. If the woman said no firmly, Natalie would let them alone. If the woman seemed a little hesitant to reject her, she would go into full-on pursuit mode, sending flowers and poetry, doing whatever she could to wear down that person's resistance. However, once she succeeded, she lost interest.

That was not the case with Liane de Pougy, who she pursued strategically, watching the procession daily until it appeared that the latest reported conquest had gone his way. Natalie disguised herself first by using the name Florance Temple Bradford so that she could remain a mystery. She sent flowers daily and little notes to intrigue the woman into meeting her. When finally, the day came to reveal herself and meet Liane in person, she arrived dressed in a costume of a Knight, there to rescue a damsel in distress. Was Liane in need of rescue?

Natalie was still corresponding with her unofficial fiancée Robert Kelso Cassatt, and he too was enabling Natalie's affairs, helping her sneak around. Natalie was always looking for places she could meet women to have sex since she was still living with her parents. Cassatt was heterosexual and at one point she even went with him to the Folies Berger and Maxims to select a prostitute for his satisfaction. However, an experience that challenged that notion that he could accept a White Marriage with her occurred. The other woman arrived to their private dining area in a restaurant where the waiters knew to leave the food aside and stay away. Though he immediately left, he could not resist watching. She later blamed him for doing so, but the man was shaken.

Natalie wanted Liane to leave the Courtesan life. Liane's friends, especially her mentor Valtesse de la Bigne, were opposed to that idea. Valtesse reminded Liane that a Courtesan could have a few weeks with another woman, but she risked losing clientele. There was always someone else ready to take her place as the number one Courtesan in Paris.

At the time there were about forty successful, rich Courtesans who were well known by the public -celebrities. Liane was called The Divine, The Queen of Love, The Pearl, and the Sultana of Sex.  Her image was in photos, on postcards and posters.  She was in the press.

Liane was considered regal, elegant, intelligent, and accomplished. She spoke English and Spanish as well as French fluently. She also played the guitar and piano well and rode a horse with style. She had no talent for acting or singing but her presence in a production meant a sold-out house. She would eventually write seven novels that were not considered to be literary, but they sold, and one play as well as her My Blue Notebooks, a diary.  Could she really give his all up?

Natalie thought so. She realized though that she would have to support Liane financially. She was still getting handouts from her father. What she was supposed to do is get married and get her dowry. Going against her principals, she wrote to Robert Kelso Cassatt and said she was ready to marry him.  She never heard back.  He had moved on and married a heterosexual woman.

Liane published a book called Idylle Saphique, a tell all about her affair with Natalie.  Natalie knew about the book having read drafts and contributed a chapter. The book, published in 1901, had all the real people's names changed to protect the guilty, including her own name and Natalie's. However, the public was wise to who was who.  Natalie wasn't entirely happy with the book's depiction of her, yet she gave out copies of it for years.

Finally, the rumors were so strong that Natalie was lesbian that her father heard about it.  He was enraged and made her promise she would never see Liane again. 

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The primary reference for this post is Wild Heart by Suzanne Rodriguez.  My notes were taken especially from pages 74, 75, 87, 90,100-101.  It's a wonderful book!

VALTESSE PROTECTS HER PROTEGE'S COURTESAN CAREER BUT LIANE DEFIES HER

From my notes:

Liane began a passionate affair with Emilienne d'Alencon, a French courtesan who was also a dancer, actress, and a gambler. She said it was Emilienne who had been her "teacher in the ways of pleasure."  As well the two women were seen out in public together and the gossip columnists loved it that the two were, as we say today, 'out.'   (Notes from page 256.)

Valtesse warned her protoge Liane that lesbians aged badly!  She though Liane was a fool, but worse, in her opinion that Emilienne was when Liane got seduced by the American ex-patriot lesbian Natalie Clifford Barney.

Barney was a pretty woman who had endured her parent's displeasure at her growing reputation as a lesbian. Upon seeing the beautiful Liane, Natalie sent the courtesan letters -signed with a fake name - and flowers until Liane would grant her an in person meeting. Natalie arrived dressed as a Prince.  (I've seen photos of Natalie in this outfit and so I think it was her costume of choice at the time, implying that she was a rescuer of women.)  Liane granted the meeting but Valtesse made sure she was there too, just to send a message to Barney as to who was 'in' on the situation.  The stage was set, Valtesse and Liane in cahoots.

Liane hid herself while Valtesse lingered in the dim light as if she were the prize.  Then Liane floated out 'dressed in diaphanous white and extended her equally pale delicate hand, which gripped Natalie's shoulders with surprising firmness." (Notes from page 238)

Liane was in on this game as well as she set up the situation to tease the besotted Natalie with her intimacy with Valtesse.

As it turned out the affair between Liane and Natalie was brief but they remained known to each other throughout their lives. The day came when Liane would decide to write books.  She would write about Natalie, thinly disguised as a character with a different name.  The day would come when Natalie would also write about her life in Paris and the famous people she had known and befriended, including Liane.  They had made impressions upon each other.

*****

NOTE  in June 2011 our Mistress of the Month was CoCo Chanel

COCO CHANEL : DESIGNER WHO CHANGED WOMENS FASHION GOT HER START AS A MISTRESS.  Here is an excerpt from the first post that month:

Did Balsan move the seamstress CoCo into his "decadent lifestyle", perhaps father a child or insist she have an abortion?

Certainly he was the person who first funded her ambitions to have a millinery shop, and then design clothes.

There were other women for him - and eventually other lovers also for her - In particular a man called Boy Chapel. Most intelligently CoCo and Etienne continued to be friends until he died in 1953. When she came to Royallieu he already had a mistress there, an actress and beauty known to be well kept by men, Emilienne d'Alecon. So perhaps the romance between them has been exaggerated.

Emilienne was 14 year older than CoCo, and perhaps if not her mentor, an example. She showed CoCo how to get along with and remain friends with ex lovers and providers. (We see this characteristic also in mistress Pamela Digby Churchill Harriman.)

*****

 Emilienne d'Alencon was born in 1870 and lived until 1945.) 

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Our primary reference for this month's subject, Courtesan Laine De Pougy, is the book titled the Mistress of Paris by author Catherine Hewitt.