PORTRAIT OF CATHERINE


text Linda Compagnoni Walther October 2009

I like to present you one of my all-time favorite pages that of the portrait of "Catherine" the way Juliette had imagined her.

When I decided to create this website late in 2007, my goal was to bring back CATHERINE to everybody's attention, Juliette' Benzonis first bestseller. A few attempts had been made by other's but that did not satisfy me. So I decided to try my luck. I was a beginner and I had to start from zero... but I wanted that when we write on Google : Catherine de Montsalvy this site could be found and to come into contact with other 'Catherine and Juliette Benzoni fans'.

Yet the Catherine de Montsalvy site does not just have pages about our heroine...I have dedicated pages to our Juliette, the author of 86 books - to dear Dame Marion, some of the former Stars, pages about the real historic characters... and many more exciting subjects. Just have a look at the site map ! to visit the Catherine site, one needs time to find all the hidden treasure's. My sister Evelyne/LaLuna has done many of the marvelous creations - as have my friends Frédérique and Hélène Rouillé. I gave them a hint and those wonderful girls came out with real Artworks.

Juliette Benzoni's personal painting


 

Dear friends of the Catherine de Montsalvy books. Let me introduce to you the 'Catherine' of our favorite author Juliette Benzoni. What you see on the above image, is a very beautiful painting which belonged to the famous writer herself. My dear friend Frédérique, webmaster of the  Juliette Benzoni official website and I have had the exceptional great honor to be invited by none other than Juliette Benzoni at her home in 2009. It had been the beginning of a very special friendship with the late author until she left us on 7 February 2016.
 

During our stay on that unbelievable first afternoon, at one point, Juliette got up and said: « Linda, do you want to know how "Catherine" looked like in my imagination ?

Have a close look at that painting over there on the wall »! I made two steps and looked for the first time at Juliette's "Catherine". I had her  permission to take the precious canvas down.

Well, I am not Arnaud de Montsalvy and can therefore not use his words which are written on top of this page - but as the passionate admirer I am of the Catherine series I must say, this beautiful painting had on the spot captured my heart! We all have had, I am sure, our own different ideas how the heroine might have looked like. Thanks to Juliette we know now how she must have imagined her very first heroine way back at the end of the Fifties when she started her research for the Novel.

Juliette told us that she had actually one of Jean van Eyck's famous Madonna paintings in mind when she started writing.

The painting 'Madonna in the Church' by 'Jan van Eyck' - created around 1438 - 1440 - is how Juliette Benzoni imagined her Catherine.
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One day she asked an artist, a very good friend of hers, if he would do her the pleasure and "create" for her Catherine de Montsalvy.

Catherine - Il suffit d'un amour 1968 Éditions Trévise

She had already seen his work for the third re-publishing of CATHERINE: IL SUFFIT D'UN AMOUR in 1968 - which had become her absolutely favourite French Book cover for Catherine.

Even though I am deeply touched to see the Artists magnificent œuvre d'art  of a young Catherine, I am not forgetting Claudine Ancelot who has in my humble opinion, brought Catherine to LIFE with her unforgettable interpretation of Catherine de Montsalvy.

Thank you dearest Juliette for your kindness and generosity to share your treasure with all of us. Thank you also Claudine for all the happy hours you bestowed on us with being our Catherine in the TV-series 'Catherine, il suffit d'un amour' directed by the ingenious Dame Marion Sarraut.
 

 Linda Compagnoni Walther
31 October 2009

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