Rosalind Polly Blakesley

speaker

237 appearances 1 recordings 1 series first heard Jul 2026 last heard 23 Jul

Rosalind Polly Blakesley’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.

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recordings per month · last 12 months

Recordings per month over the last 12 months — 1 in all, peaking in Jul 2026 with 1.

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In Our Time · Vigée Le Brun · 23 Jul 2026 podcast

Well, he commissions many portraits of her, as does her husband, in a really unnerving sort of competitive way.

But she becomes stereotyped as this very sensual creature.

There's, you know, folds of fabric falling between her legs.

And all the writing about her, of which there's an extensive passage in Vijay's memoirs, they talk about her being sort of completely vacuous and without spirit and without interest.

And she lies around on a divan.

But there's bits of the story that are really disturbing.

She, the sitter, Skavronskaya, talks of only being able to sleep if she has, in her words, a slave.

lying under her bed, sort of reciting stories to her.

And it's hard not to speculate that this is, you know, this is some sort of traumatic, ongoing sort of traumatic experience playing out.

So, yeah, Patjomkin is an uncomfortable figure in this story.

Tea, please.

And Simon, congratulations.

Thank you.

It's 11 years.

No, I didn't realise.

Thank you.

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