Frederick VIII, Queen Lovisa (Swan) and their family

[grandduchessella]

It is FAR more undignified to continue to step around the "elephant in the living room".  It is FAR more undignified to continue to suffer in silence while others run rough-shod over you. And those that did and DO -- including Charles et al -- are the MOST undignified of all. In fact, despite their so-called "elevated birth" they are the lowest order of all based on their behavior.

Well times were different--I wonder what Alix would do today when things are so much more public? I don't think Diana's behavior was diginified at all--not because she stood up and left Charles but because of the public trashing of each other they each engaged in seemingly without regard to the effect on their sons. I also wonder about Alix--she couldn't have divorced Bertie if she'd wanted to (which I don't think she did)--but she did basically leave him on occasion, heading to Denmark and Greece, when she just couldn't take it. She apparently had her own ways of fighting back.

And Louise does look just like her mother! Egads.  :-/

[Dashkova]

Times were, *of course* stupidly different, my comment was not directed to the historical doormats.

Diana's "behavior" was no less dignified than that of her husband or any of his creepy family. She was bold to do what she did and the others deserved every bit of the bad press. About bloody time.

[Martyn]

Times were, *of course* stupidly different, my comment was not directed to the historical doormats.

Diana's "behavior" was no less dignified than that of her husband or any of his creepy family. She was bold to do what she did and the others deserved every bit of the bad press. About bloody time.

Yes I have to agree.  Let's remember that she wasn't the first to go public with the dirty linen.  It was uncomfortable viewing to say the least, but it must have taken some courage to fight back in that manner and she knew that thereafter she would face the full force of the House of Windsor and all its cohorts ranged against her. 'Elephant in the living room' - I love that!  On the day that Charles marries C P-B I shall watch that Diana interview once more, just to remind myself of the princess who fought back....
GDElla. don't mistake me.  I am sure that as parents Alix and Bertie were hopeless and who can forget the rather selfish appropriation of Toria as twilight companion?  However you can't argue that George and May's children were not affected in quite serious ways by their relationship with their parents - we know they were and not just from what David had to say.  I have a feeling that more will emerge with the passing of their immediate descendants, the Queen, Lord Harewood, the Dukes of Kent and Gloucester; I think that it will be a fit and interesting subject for a serious work.
Anyway, you know that we are usually in agreement and as I said, it is often you and I who have to defend May on the sunbject of MF's jewels.  I admire May in lots of ways and I don't think that it can have been easy for her or George to step into the glamorous shoes of Bertie and Alix......

[Martyn]

Okay, I stand correected & withdraw my views!

Don't withdraw your views because we happen to disagree...Or do you now find that there was some value to her actions?

[bluetoria]

I withdrew my views because I have no really STRONG feelings about it. So much has been written about Diana that even now over seven years after her death people keep dragging up scandals & details (& not in the way we do about the Romanovs etc. but just to sell papers) that sometimes I think, 'Let the poor woman rest in peace & have a thought for the young princes.' I do still believe her behaviour was undignified & I do still think she could/should have acted differently but as other people on this thread have far stronger views than I do on the subject I am quite willing to give way & stand corrected.

[Johanna]

I'm still wondering what kind of person Lovisa was. I haven't read anything else discribing her personality than Lars Elgklou's book of Bernadotte family. He says that Louise was the apple of her father's eye and therefore spoilt and very tomboy. On the other hand a proud minx and very self conscious but called herself a "street brat from Stockholm".

Her father Karl was known to use almost offensive language but people were shocked to hear him say of his daughter that "Sessan (Louise) is damned ugly but very fun!".

But obviously she behaved a bit different when she got married and moved away from her parents.

[kmerov]

I dont know much from whats already been stated.
She didnt like politics and representetive duties. She was somewhat shy and stayed away from the public, and family gatherings. She was very happy being, what her mother-in-law feared, a boring housewife, who didnt feel comfortable around people .
This also had something to do with her being very religous, supporting "Indre Mission", a danish group who belived that life should not involve parties or amusement in generel, but devotion to your god and husband and children, whom she raised very strictly.
Besides that she liked reading and art.

[Marc]

Is there any colour portrait of Louise because I can only find grey   photos?

[grandduchessella]

This is all I have (same site as Alexandrine so it's very small). They must be their official portraits.

[kmerov]

It is their official state-portraits. Both of them hang as such in the Frederiksborg castle museum.

[grandduchessella]

Unless it was artistic license, I'm surprised that Aunt Swan showed so much cleavage!

[Tom]

I am a new member so I am not quite sure if this is the proper place to enter the discussion on those two 'cold queens', Swan and Mary.
I know little of the Swan except what I have found out here. However, Mary has always fascinated me. She always seemed to be a repressed figure. I believe that being to some extent on the fringe of the royal families because of her father's morganatic descent which he always felt agrieve by, Mary felt the need for control. She was the most intelligent of her own family and it must have been obvious that she had to make the family's fortune by her marriage.  She was, apparently willing to make the sacrifice and marry Clarence to do this. Obviously George was a much better 'deal' for her and they seemed to have a loving relationship. However, he was not her intellectual equal  and he was as restrained as she as far as emotions were concerned
and Mary seems to have put all her energy and feelings into her service to the British Crown.
Her statement that she always had to remember that her children's father was also their king, partly explains, I think, her failure to act as a bridge between father and sons. However, I when reading about her, I always feel that she would like to reach out but finds it impossible.

[bluetoria]

Why do you think she would have liked to reach out more?  

(This is a genuine question because I just can't take to her at all but many people do! I'd like to be persuaded differently.)

[Tom]

A good question;
Mary did have a closer relationship with George of Kent, her most intelligent and sensitive son. Also she went to his wife immediately upon his death.
She seems to have been close to her brother and his wife-Athlone and Princess Alice.  I believe King George had Athlone refuse the governor general's position in Canada in case he died and Mary needed her close relative.
Lady Airlie, he lady in waiting, seems to have been fond of her and Lady A seems to have been a rather no-nonsense person
Maybe she was insecure and only dared to reach out to those she was most safe with.  It is said her sister-in-laws made fun of her, because of her birth, I presume,
although it was supposedly because of her artistic interests.
On the other hand, I read somewhere that she never had a dog or dogs, unusual for the British royals, so that may be a bad sign and support you view!!

[bluetoria]

Thank you, Tom
I'm afraid I'm still not convinced ...it all seems so much like duty and so little like any warmth of personality.
I've spent nearly all day trying to find something to like about George & May but I still can't!
(The dogs...and children...just sums it up really to me - but I'm probably wrong!)