Victim of the system: Elisabeth (Sisi), Empress of Austria
“I
SAW this documentary about Empress Sisi of Austria. She
was a very unusual monarch in that I think she was quite rebellious to the court, and beloved by the people. She didn’t really play the game the way she was supposed to. But she endedupbeingmurderedbyanItalian anarchist, who stabbed her in the heart. He was a damaged person and he took it upon himself to assassinate a monarch as a political statement. But there was a tragedy to it, because he chose a monarch who was a victim of the monarchical system herself, rather than a representative of tyranny. I suppose I felt like there was an interesting shared experience between the two of them. He’d been a soldier and he was poor, life hadn’t gone the way he wanted it to. And in her own way, she was controlled and entrapped into this system herself. Then I think I just got a bit carried away with the sense of Old Europe!