http://www.geocities.com/Paris/Lights/8473/polaire.html

Tight lacing requires years of training. If you had been put in a corset in your early childhood,you could do all sorts of things with your waistline,too,although Polaire’s was tiny even by the standards of the day. Yas,it would have been a challenge to do any number of things—that’s why swooning was so common,hyperventilating being a side effect of corsetting. One of the reasons women corsetted themselves so tightly was as to symbolise they didn’t have to work hard or exert themselves. Instead,they enjoyed (?) a life of leisure and sat or reclined all day,embroidering,perhaps even reading,doing anything that didn’t require real affort. Obviously,working class women didn’t have this luxury so tightlacing was a culture signifier of caste.

Polaire and Colette did not have a sexual affair. If they had,Colette would have said so. Polaire had male lovers and protectors,never female. Perhaps she and Willy had a fling but that is a mystery,shrouded in the mists of time. Colette and Polaire were actually in competition—-of the ‘keep your friends close and your enemies closer’ variety. Colette admired Polaire’s ability as an actress but once she got her own stage career off the ground,she dropped Polaire and had little to do with her there after.

So how’s your writing ? Are their excerpts that I can peruse somewhere in cyberspace ?

I have Judith Thurman’s biography – isn’t it wonderful! (Very opinionated – which makes me wonder how objective her interpretation of events is – but that makes for excellent reading.)

The Polaire website very firmly rejects any unseemly speculation about Polaire’s relationship with Colette, and puts all the “blame” on poor Colette… but realistically, 100 years later, none of us can ever really know. Being a romantic, I like to imagine that there was a little flame of admiration at least…

I am a wee bit sceptical about all these claims of women having a 14 inch waist – how did they manage to breathe! Imagine climbing stairs, let alone any more energetic activity…

Thanks again for visiting!
Sarah

The book “Secrets of the Flesh: A Life of Colette” (Ballantine Reader’s Circle) by Judith Thurman contains a fair amount of material on Colette’s relationships with Polaire and WIlly.

In taking a quick look at web-sites on Polaire they reported that she had a 13 inch waist, 14 inch, and 15 inch! It would be curious to go to contemporary French magazines and newspapers and see what the actual articles said. It also strikes me as a funny coincidence that Anna Held also advertised a small waist, 14 inch I believe {I’m writing this without my notes}, and she would advertise that she could fasten a man’s shirt collar around her waist (I believe that the stunt was actually a creation of both her and Ziegfeld).

In addition the public often confuses Polaire, Camille Clifford, Evelyn Nesbit and Anna Held. Primary source materials are the way to go here.
Take care

There is a passage in ‘my apprenticeship’ in which Colette describes an incident at a theatre when she.Polaire and Willy were being stared at by the other patrons. Polaire doesn’t want to go along with the game b/c she can ‘feel’ the patrons thoughts—that she and Colette are lovers—and is repelled. Colette says her years of training as Willy’s wife made the situation tolerable to herself.

I am using a computer at the public libray ,which will not allow me to use the email link. You can email me at pamchrlsptts@aol.com. I am always interested in discussing Polaire and the Willys. I am presently researching Polaire and her life so if you have anything about her,let me know.