ABSTRACT
In this article, I examine depictions of Lola Montez, a self-professed Spanish dancer whose relationship with the Bavarian king Ludwig I contributed to his abdication during the Revolutions of 1848–49. First, I examine the ways in which pamphlets and the press helped transform the Montez affair into a cause célèbre that hastened revolutionary unrest in Bavaria. Next, I examine satirical libels that focused on Montez’s political power, her sexual libertinism, and her foreign identity. Finally, I examine the ways in which Montez responded to her critics in letters and autobiographical projects by fashioning herself simultaneously as an innocent victim of political Catholicism and as an emancipated woman who challenged social expectations. These divergent depictions of Montez provide a rare opportunity to analyze her objectification and agency during the middle decades of the nineteenth century.
