Page 32 - aruba-today-20171016

A32 FEATURE
Monday 16 october 2017
Spy, temptress, victim? Mata Hari still eludes definition

By RAF CASERT Fatal Lover.” ‘’All these al- revealed Mata Hari as a
Associated Press legations that are coming double agent two-timing
LEEUWARDEN, Netherlands out now and you just won- France. She was arrested
(AP) — A century ago on der, ‘But what’s changed while having breakfast in
Sunday, an exotic dancer in 100 years?’ Not much.” her suite at the Elysee Pal-
named Mata Hari was ex- On a canal close to her ace Hotel.
ecuted by a French firing childhood home, where During 16 interrogation ses-
squad, condemned as a vicious winds and icy tem- sions, she cracked and ad-
sultry Dutch double agent peratures can freeze the mitted to working for the
who supposedly caused water for months, a statue Germans. At 41, she was
the deaths of thousands of erected in 1976 shows Mata shot at a military ground
soldiers during World War I. Hari in her typical stage re- close to Paris at dawn on
Her life and death became galia. Dressed in little more Oct. 15, 1917.
fodder almost overnight for than pearls and veils, she The rest is history — and
one of the greatest spy sto- stands with legs apart and an awful lot of books and
ries of all time — featuring arms outstretched, ready movies, including one star-
an alluring temptress who to take on the world. ring Greta Garbo. Mata
could dance, dazzle and How she got to the glitter- Hari’s story ebbs and flows
draw secrets from the hap- ing salons and theaters of with the mood of the times
less military men unable to Paris and Berlin before end- and geography.
resist her. ing up in front of a firing “When I was talking to
Increasingly, though, Mata squad was due to despera- people in France, even un-
Hari — the stage name tion as much as boldness. til quite recently, their view
adopted by Margaretha Her comfortable youth was was very much more that
Zelle — is also being reinter- disrupted when her father ‘Here was this decadent
preted as a victim of a time went broke and her mother woman who was respon-
when a sexually liberated died. At age 18, she an- sible for all these deaths,
woman with artistic am- swered an ad placed by so why should we feel any
bitions faced harsh judg- an aristocrat military officer sympathy for her?’” Wheel-
ment. seeking a wife. Soon, she wright said. In the Nether-
The irony is not missed on was living in the Dutch East lands, there was more am-
Yves Rocourt, curator of Indies, in what is now Indo- bivalence.
“Mata Hari. The Myth and nesia. An undated photo of dancer “Mata Hari”. Born Margaretha Zelle “They stressed more the spy
the Maiden,” an exhibit The couple had two chil- who was executed during World War I for being a spy. story and the exotic danc-
opening this weekend in dren despite her husband’s Associated Pressa er rather than the fact she
Leeuwarden, the Dutch violence and unfaithfulness “I am tired of struggling Building a dance repertoire was a decadent woman,”
town where Zelle was born and Margaretha’s own against life,” she wrote. The on the sensuous temple Oldersma said in front of
in 1876. “Unfortunately, is- fiery, flirtatious personal- choice she saw was to “be dances she had observed the Mara Hari statue as it
sues like money and hav- ity. After their son died, the a decent mother or live life in Asia, Mata Hari had was being restored for the
ing to sleep with someone marriage disintegrated and as it is dazzlingly offered to her breakthrough perfor- commemorations.
in a position of power to her ex-husband refused to me here.” mance at the Paris Musee With the publication of his
achieve something are not pay alimony. Zelle, facing Lourens Oldersma, who ed- Guimet on March 13, 1905. book last year, “people
time-related,” Rocourt said. being a single mother with- ited a book of Mata Hari’s She soon became a sensa- started realizing that, yes,
“You cannot help but think out financial support, gave letters published late last tion across Europe. this is also a mother, and
about what is going in Holly- up custody of her daugh- year, said “she evolved But the brilliant life she en- she had to go through a
wood at this very moment,” ter and in 1903 left for Paris, from being a flirt into the visioned was expensive to fight,” he said.
said Julie Wheelwright, au- where she reinvented her- woman that started living maintain, especially as she Still, the question of who
thor of the biography “The self. this loose, decadent life.” got older and her popu- Mata Hari really was de-
larity as an exotic dancer fies easy answers. One year
declined. When World War she refused to pose naked
I broke out, she used her for a painter, the next she
passport from a neutral slept with men for money.
country to continue travel- The verdict on whether the
ing and took wealthy, well- secrets she gained from
connected lovers from all her lovers’ lips’ doomed
sides of the conflict. thousands of young Allied
The promise of a steady soldiers continues to be de-
supply of francs to support bated but seems increas-
herself persuaded Zelle to ingly unlikely.
accept an offer to spy, first “There is a kind of para-
for Germany and then for doxical thing going on,”
France. Wheelwright said. “On the
“She thought that spying one hand, she is very vul-
was just another role. It nerable. But then on the
was another kind of perfor- other hand, she’s also got a
mance,” Wheelwright said. sense of manipulating peo-
“She was very naive.” ple.” The mystery of Mata
French intelligence eventu- Hari still confounds Rocourt,
ally intercepted a German the exhibit curator.
In this photo taken on Friday, Oct. 13, 2017, a visitor views posters of movies that have been telegram discussing the “The truth is very complex,”
made about Margaretha Zelle, also known as Mata Hari, at the Fries Museum in Leeuwarden, work of an agent code- he said. “I don’t know what
Netherlands.
Associated Press named H-21. The details the truth is.”q