Review of SISI - pbs passport - a historical period series about Austro-Hungarian Empire

If you don't have it, I strongly recommend the PBS Passport which costs oly $60 for a year and offers an infinite set of shows, series in every genre. My favoirite is NOVA - I just watched a great NOVA documentary on Astronomy in Senegal, and before that an update on one of my favorite archaeology/anthropology subects Oetzi the Alpine body found that is the oldest human remains in the world. But right now, I am watching Ssi (short for Elizabeth) about the Bavarian Duchess who married Franz Joseph the Austrian Emperor in 1850.

There are so many things to think about while watching this series. I am on Season 2. First of all, the constant maneuvering of alliances to keep the baying wolves from attacking. All the little nation states and empires are constantly in danger of being gobbled up by a neighbor which is what happened to Hungary. Austria gobbled it up. And Napoleon, the hungriest wolf of all is marching across Europe gobbling up one country after another until, as we all know now, he bites off more than he can chew and loses his army to the Russian winter. In the series, Napoleon is gobbling up Lombardy and Franz Joseph is trying to make an alliance first with the confederation of German speaking city/states, the German Convederation of Saxony, Hesse, Prussia, Bavaria and 35 other principalities. Eventually, Prussia gobbled up those neighbors and the country of Germany was created. All of these little countries came about by the disintegration of the Holy Roman Empire. What

What it reminded me of was Putin's attempted take-over of Ukraine and the scramble of the Nordic neighbors, Finland, Estonia, Latvia and Sweden to get into NATO for protection from this greedy insane neighbor who is waiting to destroy them in order to take over their land.

What came next to my mind were thoughts about the connection between feudalism and patriarchy. The young females of the aristoratic land rulers auctioned off up the scale of royalty as breeders for the dynasties. Young Elizabeth of Bavaria was 16 when she married Franz Joseph, Emperor of Austria, who was 23. When she is giving birth to the first offspring of their union, the crowds outside the palace weight expectantly while the church bells toll, first the safe delivery, then the sex of the child. A sign of disappointment when it is revealed the child is a female and not a male heir to the throne.

Queen Victoria who was reigning uring this same period as the drama Sisi is set, gave birth to nine children. That is one year pregnant and another year breast feeding and recovering, so total of 18 years of childbearing, although of course, royal mothers probably employed wet-nurses, poor women who breast fed other women's babies for pay. Childbirth is a traumatic experience which although universal is nonetheless, of colossal proportion in physical pain and fear. Having done this once myself, I truly cannot imagine having to go through it 9 times! The average women prior to birth control gave birth to 7 children. "One in every three children born in 1800, died before its fifth birthday."

The array of diseases in staggering from smallpox to cholera, diptheria, typhus, measles, whooping cough, etc. I know these names from all the innoculations my daughter received when she was a baby. Death rate for women in childbirth is also shocking.

Primogeniture means that only males inherit, and this was the standard throughout Europe until late twentieth century. Male children inherited the property, and the Empire! And they had rights to the children as well. A woman gave birth but the man owned the woman and the children. This didn't change until the successive waves of Feminist Revolution that were always occuring but reached greater success in the Feminist fight for Suffrage in England and the United States in the 1900's. Without the vote, women couldn't change the laws.

My latest Art Project is called Pennants. It is for the 'THROUGH A WOMAN'S EYES" Annual Art Exhibition held at the Haddon Fortnightly in Haddonfield, NJ. It is a joint effort of the Haddon Fortnightly Women's Club and the 50/50 Club of high school young women. About 75 artists participate in the show.

My project was 8 pennants on a cork board with portraits of women of success in 8 fields: Art-Kara Walker, Books-Christiane Amanpour for Journalism, and J. K. Rowling for fiction, Entertainment-Opra Winfrey, Media Mogul, Beyonce and Taylor Swift, music billionaires, Politics-Kamala Harris, US Vice-President, Religion-Nadia Bolz-Weber, NYTimes bestselling author and influential Lutheran pastor, Pema Chodron, Buddhist abbot of Gumpo Abbey in Nova Scotia and successful author of two dozen books, Sports-Serena Williams, Technology/Science-Charpentier and Doudna, Nobel prize winning creators of CRISPR, the gene editing process, and finally, World Affairs-Greta Thunberg (Climate activist) and Malala Yousefzai, activist for female education in the Middle East.

Doing that project was a demonstration to me, of how far we have come. Yet the fight goes on. Here in America in 2024 the battle for control of Women's Reproductive rights still continues. And here in 2024 a greedy neighbor still attempts to attack and grab a neibhoring country. But the processes are still evolving. From the German confederation to world wide unions like NATO, we are learning to form cooperative grops to protect us. And women, at least in Europe and the United States have close to full equality in the law.

What all of this means to me is that there is evolution, but the struggle is never over. Right now in America, a would-be dictator and exploiter of women attempts to turn back the clock and destroy democracy and replace it with a theocratic/dictatorship, and a lot of people support him. "The arc of the moral universe is long but it bends toward justice." Martin Luther King. This hopeful message reminds us to stay faithful and active. Also, doing a project like Pennants showed me the material proof of this observation.

Just this month a female member of Sinn Fein was elected president of Northern Ireland, Michelle O'Neill. Rutger's Astroner Kristen McQuinn will lead NASA's Science Operation Center for the Nancy Grace Telescope. Each week another notable woman shows how far we have come.When I watch the NOVA documentaries, I am thrilled to see the proliferation of women scientists narrating the programs and working in the Labs. We still have a long way to go (technology is slow to progress) but we are headed in the right direction and making good progress. And, by the way, I forgot to mention one of my favorites Angela Merkel two time Chancellor of German and often cknowledged as the chief leader of the Econimic Union in Europe! Let me not close without a nod to the past and Golda Meir - were she only here now, perhaps peace would once again grace the Middle East and an end to the war between Israel and Palestine be stopped.

February Black History Month - suggestions

Gloucester County Historical Society a block down from our Meeting is exhibiting on African American Troops in the Civil War, so if you are local and free, you may want to drop in and visit. We have shared some events with GCHS and their library and museum are a treasure!

Also, if you have Netflix, you may want to view RUSTIN which has been nominated for film awards and is an excellent and riveting film about the Quaker Civil Rights activist Bayard Rustin. So there is a go-to and a film and one more -

All the local Camden County Libraries are featuring music events Motown to Rock and Roll AND there is a Henry Louis Gates documentary coming on PBS on Gospel Music!

I hope this helps everyone find something interesting for February Black History Month. Perhaps someone else has a book review to offer.

HappyTrails my friends! Jo Ann wrightj45@yahoo.com