First of all, thank you very much for your kind comments on the site Polaire 1900. I am working on this site for several years now, and new documents are added on a regular basis (there are currently over 70 documents on the site).

To respond to Pam’s question, the site address is : http://www.polaire-1900.com/ (yes, sorry, the site is in French only, but I am thinking of translating some pages into English, with the help of an american friend).

I also would like to respond to Sarah, who writes that “the Polaire website very firmly rejects any unseemly speculation about Polaire’s relationship with Colette, and puts all the “blame” on poor Colette…”. Well, I do not reject the possibility of a love relationship between Polaire and Colette on principle (and put no blame on Colette).

I only stress the fact that (as far as I know) none of Colette’s biographers suggests the possibility of such a relationship. And that, in a passage of her diary quoted in Colette’s book “Lettres au Petit Corsaire”, Renée Hamon writes that Colette told her that she had once expressed to Polaire her desire to make love with her, but that Polaire had refused.

And Polaire herself clearly rejects this possibility when she writes in her autobiography (“Polaire par elle-même”, published in 1933), page 123 : “Dire que tant de légendes ont pu s’échafauder sur moi, alors que je n’ai jamais pu comprendre les mœurs anormales !…” (“When I think to all the legends that have been written about me, whereas I have never understood abnormal behaviours”). I also underline (and give examples of) the fact that Polaire never rejected anyone on account of his/her sexual behaviour.

Well, I don’t speak English as well as I would like to, but I hope that this clarifies my comment on this subject on the website.

And do you know the book “La Folie Polaire” (The Polaire Madness) that was published in France in 2007? Written par Jean-Baptiste Thiérrée, this book is a novel including accurate biographical informations on Polaire. The story is that of a man who begins to collect items on Polaire and who is gradually convinced that she is still alive. He is from time to time the witness of events that occured in Polaire’s real life. The book is in French (sorry!) but with about 50 photographs of Polaire. This book is available on the Internet.

And if you are looking for information on Polaire, please feel free to email me.

My opinon of the photos:
I’ve looked at a lot of antique photos and have concluded that if the props are the same from pic to pic,they were taken at one setting;usually,at least 6 were taken at a time. I’d say the 4th,5th and 8th from the left are from the same sitting. Yes,I agree that these look modified. (I have a gorgeous pic of her in which,if you look closely,you can see that her waistline was altered.) I love how deliciously naughty and nearly demonic she looks in them. I bet she broke a lot of hearts.

I’ll look over the pics and see if I can figure out more about them. Yes,I am that compulsive over the Divine Melle P.

The quote is by Jean Lorrain,a homosexual jounalist who was also friends with Colette and Willy. He wrote a very spiteful book about their marraige and said many rude things. I wish I could read French ! I bet it’s juicy !

Lorrain is writing of her perfomance when she was a danseuse epileptique/gommeuse. Rae Beth Gordon has written about Polaire in articles and in a book called’”Why the French Love jerry lewis’. I reccommend you look up her stuff. She’s knowledgeable and sheds light on a facinating time in history and helped me to understand Polaire in the perspective of her era.

http://www.geocities.com/Paris/Lights/8473/polaire.html

Tight lacing requires years of training. If you had been put in a corset in your early childhood,you could do all sorts of things with your waistline,too,although Polaire’s was tiny even by the standards of the day. Yas,it would have been a challenge to do any number of things—that’s why swooning was so common,hyperventilating being a side effect of corsetting. One of the reasons women corsetted themselves so tightly was as to symbolise they didn’t have to work hard or exert themselves. Instead,they enjoyed (?) a life of leisure and sat or reclined all day,embroidering,perhaps even reading,doing anything that didn’t require real affort. Obviously,working class women didn’t have this luxury so tightlacing was a culture signifier of caste.

Polaire and Colette did not have a sexual affair. If they had,Colette would have said so. Polaire had male lovers and protectors,never female. Perhaps she and Willy had a fling but that is a mystery,shrouded in the mists of time. Colette and Polaire were actually in competition—-of the ‘keep your friends close and your enemies closer’ variety. Colette admired Polaire’s ability as an actress but once she got her own stage career off the ground,she dropped Polaire and had little to do with her there after.

So how’s your writing ? Are their excerpts that I can peruse somewhere in cyberspace ?

I have Judith Thurman’s biography – isn’t it wonderful! (Very opinionated – which makes me wonder how objective her interpretation of events is – but that makes for excellent reading.)

The Polaire website very firmly rejects any unseemly speculation about Polaire’s relationship with Colette, and puts all the “blame” on poor Colette… but realistically, 100 years later, none of us can ever really know. Being a romantic, I like to imagine that there was a little flame of admiration at least…

I am a wee bit sceptical about all these claims of women having a 14 inch waist – how did they manage to breathe! Imagine climbing stairs, let alone any more energetic activity…

Thanks again for visiting!
Sarah

Hi Paul, thank you so much. I had a look at your website – it’s wonderful! I look forward to ordering a copy of A CAFÉ IN SPACE: THE ANAÏS NIN LITERARY JOURNAL very soon, and maybe, if I’m feeling brave, submitting my Anaïs story… we shall see! Thanks again for visiting. All the best, Sarah

The book “Secrets of the Flesh: A Life of Colette” (Ballantine Reader’s Circle) by Judith Thurman contains a fair amount of material on Colette’s relationships with Polaire and WIlly.

In taking a quick look at web-sites on Polaire they reported that she had a 13 inch waist, 14 inch, and 15 inch! It would be curious to go to contemporary French magazines and newspapers and see what the actual articles said. It also strikes me as a funny coincidence that Anna Held also advertised a small waist, 14 inch I believe {I’m writing this without my notes}, and she would advertise that she could fasten a man’s shirt collar around her waist (I believe that the stunt was actually a creation of both her and Ziegfeld).

In addition the public often confuses Polaire, Camille Clifford, Evelyn Nesbit and Anna Held. Primary source materials are the way to go here.
Take care