Inflicting More Pain Than Sacrifice… Poem by Margaret Alice

The enormous contrast between Lady Jane Digby El Mezrab
and Marie DuPlessis, the original of La Traviata, is astounding;
Lady Digby was cultured and rich; travelled independently on
a large Inheritance - while Marie DuPlessis was of poor origin,
selling herself to obtain education and wealth

Lady Jane found true love several times and in the end had
a perfect marriage with a brilliant Bedouin - while Marie
DuPlessis was enslaved by a desire for a glittering lifestyle
that she would not give up for the love of a young Dumas –
dying of consumption at age twenty-three, she never knew

A long, happy relationship with just one perfect love, she
chose a glamorous life of dissipation over the many sacrifices
required by moral duty in the life of a drudge; she preferred
being a courtesan rather than existing as a Hausfrau devoted
to a lawful husband; believing herself incapable

Of suffering the vicissitudes that constitute the life of common
labourers; though it would have preserved her from a pointless
existence, she chose to be the brilliant toy of millionaires
inflicting more pain than sacrifice to labour would have
done – each time I read her story, I cry again…