Welcome to La Maupin, Mistress of the Sword

“La Maupin, Mistress of the Sword” is a website about a book and the person it stars. It is also the name of that book, written by me, Jim Burrows. And surprise! the woman was known as “La Maupin”.

La Maupin: Julie d’Aubigné

Julie d’Aubigné was born late in the year 1673 in France, probably in or around Paris. In December of 1690, at the age of 17, she made her debut with the Paris opera on the stage at the Palais Royale in the Académie de Musique production of Cadmus et Hermione. By all accounts the audience loved her, leading to a successful 15-year career, though there was a period of 3 years when she was absent from the Paris stage.

That absence was caused by a few of the other reasons that she is famous: she was a notorious, cross-dressing, sword-wielding bisexual woman, prone to scandal, duels and brawls. In the fall of 1695, she attended, probably crashed, a ball thrown by Monsieur, the King’s brother, while dressed as a cavalier. She danced and flirted with all the most beautiful women. When she passionately kissed the belle of the ball, three young men took umbrage and she found herself challenged to duel with each of them. The four retired across the street, and soon she returned to inform her host that he had best summon a doctor, as there were three men in the street bleeding out.

It is said that the King let her off because his proclamation had only forbidden the men of Paris from dueling. She left town nonetheless, because the powerful families of the three men were not nearly as amused as the King and his brother. She fled Paris for Brussels, where one of the other reasons for her notoriety came to in play: her romantic liaisons with extremely powerful men. In this case, it was the Elector of Bavaria, one of the three contenders for the title of Holy Roman Emperor.

Early on, she had been the mistress of Monsieur le Grand, the Duc d’Armagnac, Grand Écuyer of France—one of the seven Great Officers of the Crown. After that, she became the lover of Louis-Joseph, Comte d’Albert, who was destined to become a prince and one of the most powerful officers in the court of none other than the Elector of Bavaria. She and d’Albert had a classic “meet-cute”—she ran him through while dueling with him and two of his friends.

Then there were the women she loved—the beautiful marquise, the debauched nun from the burning convent, her costars in the opera—but… I must leave something for the book and future articles.

The Book: La Maupin, Mistress of the Sword

La Maupin, Mistress of the Sword is a book three decades in the making. I first learned about La Maupin from a short biography of her in the inroduction to Jessica Amanda Salmonson’s 1982 “Amazons II” anthology, but could find nothing else about her. So in 1994, I created a web page listing what I knew and asking anyone who knew more to email me. The page grew in leaps and bounds, and after a decade or so, I decided to turn her life into a novel. Writing an historical novel in your spare time is not a task for the faint-hearted, so it wasn’t until my third attempt, after I retired, that I ever really got very far.

So, how far have you gotten, Jim?

The novel as it stands today is 10 chapters, more than 30,000 words, and looks like it will be about 24 chapters when it is complete. While I have the book outlined, it's hard to know exactly how long each episode in her life will be until I get it down in actual writing, and there are lots of bits of business that spawn additional research, even after three decades.

Still, I'm far enough along that I'm looking for a cover artist and beginning to think about publishing snippets, behind the scenes articles and the like, which brings us to…

The Web Site: LaMaupin.com(aliases)

This is the second incarnation of LaMaupin.com. The first, which was a blog, a database, an editing platform and a chat, was very cool, but suffered a tragic death. It did serve me as a good springboard for actually starting to write the novel and, truth be told, I still pick over its remaining bones during this, my third foray into writing her story.

This version is growing as the novel does, and is coming into its own as the novel reaches about 30,000 words. My intent is for it to act as a way for prospective readers and fans of La Maupin to accompany me on my journey with Julie and the others towards the elusive publication date. It's also a place (along with my mailing list) where I will be soliciting feedback and asking opinions and advice.

Both I and others have written a good deal about La Maupin over the years and the Links button at the top of the page will take you a page linking to my earlier writings, web resources, and both novels and reference material by other authors.

I'll be sharing excerpts from the book, background information on Julie, the characters and setting, and some of the questions I struggle with as I am writing. The Spoilers button will take you to a page where I'll be sharing all of these things.

---

aliases:

LaMaupin.com can also be reached via its aliases: LaMaupin.info, LaMaupin.net, LaMaupin.org, MistressOfTheSword.com, and SwordsMistress.com.