Why does Johan op de Beeck’s biography of Louis XIV fascinate me?

[First published on Medium.com, February 2, 2023]

I recently bought De Zonnekoning. Glorie en schaduw van Lodewijk XIV on a whim. It caught my eye when browsing the local bookstore. I was near the tail end of a short infatuation with the Napoleonic era and I knew the author had written a thick biography of that other towering figure of French mythistory.

De Zonnekoning hooked me. Why? How? What does it do? An introspective stream-of-consciousness case study of historiography.

First. Johan op de Beeck is a great and — more importantly — effective storyteller. This biography is a good illustration of the lesson we ought to draw from the famous quip (supposedly even quoted by the first half of the duo that inspires my nom de guerre) that the historian is a failed novelist. Op de Beeck has no academic background in history. He does not claim to be a historian. While the job has no gatekeepers and the “title” is anyone’s to claim. The fact that Op de Beeck opts not to signifies a distinction between the (academically trained) historian and the historyteller. I find this distinction interesting. This supports this ethos.

Second. De Zonnekoning is explicitly a Dutch (language) book. Op de Beeck is a master of the language. Some of the idiom and colorful descriptions might be more familiar to a Flemish audience, but it consistently reads refreshingly. As ‘the Author’ (with a capital A) Op de Beeck is explicitly in ‘the Text’. I — and this is ultimately just a personal axiom- prefer this to the faux-objectivity of the impersonal voice. I find his language most memorable when describing the decadence and debauchery of Louis’ court in the early part of his seniority rule. The subtleties of native language that are untranslatable.

Third. The author is obviously passionate about the subject. I did not know anything of Op de Beeck other than him having written multiple doorstoppers on French historical figures. This passionate interest adds to his ethos beforehand. Regardless of eventual quality, the author has a lot of something to tell.

Intermezzo. Having now mentioned ethos, I need to introduce the other Aristotelean concepts of pathos and logos. These are three core modes of persuasion in rhetoric. Ethos appeals to the speaker’s (in)formal authority on the subject. Pathos appeals to the audience’s emotions. Logos appeals to the, well, logic of the argument. Rhetoric as a discipline studies what it takes to win an argument, to convince a public or jury. History and literature do not necessarily need to convince you of something.

Fourth. The emplotment of De Zonnekoning is as a tragedy. Op de Beeck structures his story of the life of Louis XIV as a magnificent rise to greatness with a bittersweet end. It’s right there in the subtitle of the book. His Louis is a man who in building the pinnacle of absolute monarchy laid the foundations for the end of the Ancién Regime. Do I prefer this type of historical narrative to others? Or is this a good example of one such type? I think this type of emplotment fits the biographical genre better than other genres or styles of writing.

Fifth. A biography, not a hagiography. Op de Beeck remains critical of Louis XIV. No aspect of the king is left uncriticized. From his many moral failings to his shortcomings as statesman. To me the distinction between biography and hagiography (as a form of propaganda) is that in biography its subject must be judged twofold. All biography ought to at least judge its protagonist to his/her own standards and those of his/her time. Historical biography additionally questions if it was a life worth living. There must be a moral to the story! Why else tell one?

Sixth. Nostalgia and comfort. The internet was a different thing in my preadolescence. Most of my consumption of historical media was televised by the Discovery Channel or historical fiction (books, comics, movies). Most of these are centered around a single or small group of person(s). I have been primed to prefer individual stories over structuralist explanations! I jest. Slightly. Reading biographies is a comfortable activity. In this manner the genre’s tropes and conventions are working their pathos.

Seventh. The use of metaphor. This intersects with points two and four. I just prefer metaphorical language to technical language. This means that my preferred type of history will inherently be meaningful. I am not sure whether ‘technical’, ‘dry’ or ‘material’ historical writing can even be history. Although, simultaneously, history can’t afford to be too metaphorical. The narrative must be supported by facts or at least descriptions that are possibly true. In this sense biography benefits from avoiding linguistic simplifications absolutely necessary for contextualizing more abstract historical processes like ‘the Second World War’ or ‘le Grand Siècle’: The stylistic device of the Pars pro toto (“Napoleon invaded Italy” when referring to the army that did) and its cousing the Totum pro parte (“Imperial Germany signed an armistice with the Entente Powers on 11 November 1918” when referring to the politicians and diplomats that did). In biography the singular person always does things. Although, funnily, one recurring theme in De Zonnekoning is the separation between person (Louis XIV) and state (France). The metaphor most employed to represent the Sun King’s glory and shadow is the palace of Versailles.

Eight. I don’t believe that every biography of any “great” historical figure inherently ascribes to the “Great Man-theory” of history, but all biography necessarily presupposes that a single individual can change the greater structures that shape its environment. The drama in any biography comes from whether the biographized succeeds or not. I have a fondness for ‘great stories’. The story of Louis XIV is grand. It has far more grandeur than Geert Mak’s (another Dutch-language, explicitly-not-a-historian author of serious popular history) Hoe God verdween uit Jorwert — a book describing the decline of a small Frisian village in the second half of the 20th century- which I remember not enjoying as much. In short. Op de Beeck writes the historical stories I want to read. Which ties into point six above.

Conclusions. It’s a good book. I think it’s a good history. It made me think. It kept me engaged until the end. It’s 700 pages of mostly Louis XIV majestically striding aesthetically through his palaces from hedonistic debauchery to political crisis.

It might be personally interesting to re-evaluate Geert Mak in light of this read. I recently read De Bourgondiërs (by Bart van Loo, another another Dutch-language, explicitly-not-a-historian author of serious popular history. Historians! Read my very first point very carefully!). A respectable tome of about 600 pages dedicated to a single dynasty of four French/”Dutch” feudal rulers. I could not finish De Bourgondiërs, being burnt out by the end of Philip the Good’s reign. Bart van Loo is also a gifted author, it was not the prose that lost my interest. What was? Might also be interesting to re-evaluate De Bourgondiërs.

I want to re-explore ‘mythistory’. It’s what I was conceptually exploring near the end of my studies ten years ago. Others have used the term and I need to read up on how they understand it.