Lola Montez

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Eliza Rosanna Gilbert [link] (February 17, 1821 – January 17, 1861), better known by the stage name Lola Montez, was an Irish-born dancer and actress who became famous as an exotic dancer, courtesan and the mistress of King Ludwig I of Bavaria.

Contents

1 Early life
2 Life as a courtesan
3 Later life
4 Lola Montez in fiction
5 Further reading
6 External links

Early life

She was born in Grange, County Sligo, and like many other aspects of her life, discrepant reports of her birth have been published. The statement that she was born in Limerick, Ireland, in 1818 (published by the Encyclopædia Britannica among others) is false.

In 1823 the Gilberts moved to India. Shortly after arrival her father died of cholera. Her mother remarried the following year and sent Eliza back to the British Isles to live with relatives of her stepfather.

In 1837 sixteen-year-old Eliza eloped with Lieutenant Thomas James. The couple separated five years later and Eliza became an exotic dancer under a stage name. Her London debut as "Lola Montez, the Spanish dancer" in June 1843 was disrupted when she was recognized as Mrs. James. The resulting notoriety did not hurt her career and she quickly became famous both for her self-created "Tarantula Dance", and the expression "Whatever Lola wants, Lola gets." It was around this time that she became involved in the practice of living on an income from wealthy men, as their courtesan. [link]

Life as a courtesan

By her late teens, Montez had become aware of the financial gains of serving as a courtesan to powerful and wealthy men. Amongst her lovers and benefactors during this time were Franz Liszt and Alexander Dumas. Liszt had introduced her to the circle of George Sand, which was one of the most sophisticated and advanced in European society. (source: Langer)

In 1846, she traveled to Munich, where she was discovered by, and quickly became the mistress of, Ludwig I of Bavaria. She quickly began to use her influence on the king and this made her unpopular with the local population, particularly after documents showing that she was hoping to become a naturalised Bavarian citizen and be elevated to the nobility were made public. Despite the opposition, Ludwig made her Countess of Landsfeld on his next birthday, August 25, 1847. It seems likely that these actions contributed greatly to the fall from grace of the previously popular king. In 1848 under pressure from a growing revolutionary movement Ludwig abdicated, and Lola fled Bavaria for the United States. This effectively ended her career as a courtesan. [link]

From 1851 to 1853 she performed as a dancer and actress in the eastern United States, then moved to San Francisco in May 1853. There she married Patrick Hull in July and moved to Grass Valley, California, in August. By the mid-1850s her marriage was failing. Lola moved to Victoria, Australia to make her fortune by entertaining miners at the gold diggings during the gold-rush of the 1850s. [link]

Historian Michael Cannon says "In September 1855 she performed her erotic Spider Dance at the Theatre Royal in Melbourne, raising her skirts so high that the audience could see she wore no underclothing at all. Next day the Argus thundered that her performance was 'utterly subversive to all ideas of public morality". Respectable families ceased to attend the theatre, which began to show heavy losses.” (Melbourne After the Gold Rush, p.313-4). She spent nearly four years in Victoria. At Castlemaine in April 1856, she was “rapturously encored” after her Spider Dance in front of 400 diggers (including members of the Municipal Council who had adjourned their meeting early to attend the performance), but drew the wrath of the audience by insulting them following some mild heckling. [link]

She earned further notoriety in Ballarat when after reading a bad review in The Ballarat Times she chased the editor, Henry Seekamp with a whip. The "Lola Montes Polka" composed by Albert Denning was inspired by this event. She later moved to New York.

Later life

On June 30, 1860, she suffered a stroke and was partially paralyzed for some time. In mid-December she had recovered enough to walk with a slight limp and went out for a stroll in the cold weather. Her life as a courtesan was over, and her money was by now gone. Lola began to seek out the word of God. In her dying days, she was cared for by a priest - though she reportedly determined first that he was not a Jesuit, having many bad memories of that order. [link]

She contracted pneumonia, lingering for nearly a month before dying one month short of her fortieth birthday. She is buried in Green-Wood Cemetery, in Brooklyn, New York.

Lola Montez in fiction

Montez's life was portrayed in the 1955 film Lola Montes by Max Ophüls.

Montez also appears in Royal Flash, Volume 2 of the Flashman Papers by George MacDonald Fraser, where she has a brief affair with Flashman

Montez is featured prominently in the final installment (Spider Dance) of the Irene Adler mystery series by Carole Nelson Douglas. Montez is rumored to be the title character's mother.

External links

[Lola Montez's Gravesite]