Personality
Alexandra was tall, slender with a small head of refined features. Her blue eyes were set deep in her head. She had an air of regal majesty. Her quick, light walk was graceful. She was frail, often in poor health. Her voice was hoarse, but she spoke rapidly and with decision.
Alexandra Feodorovna was an avid reader and enjoyed music. She was kind and liked privacy and simplicity. She dressed elegantly, with a decided preference for light colors, and collected beautiful jewels. Neither arrogant nor frivolous, Alexandra was not without intelligence and had an excellent memory; her reading was quite extensive; her judgment of men sure, slightly ironical. However, she took no active interest in politics and fulfilled the role of being an empress consort, rather than being active in the public sphere. She loved her family very dearly, and even developed facial tics whilst fearing the Decembrist Uprising and its plans to kill her family. The facial tics were a trait that run in the royal German-Russian-British family in many branches.
For her, Russia was summed up in the person of her beloved husband. By forcing his will on this fragile, irresponsible and delicate creature, Nicholas destroyed Alexandra’s individuality. Her husband gave her no time for reflection, for giving herself a sustained occupation, other than adoring wife and devoted mother.
Read more about this topic: Alexandra Feodorovna (Charlotte Of Prussia)
Famous quotes containing the word personality:
“It is remarkable that almost all speakers and writers feel it to be incumbent on them, sooner or later, to prove or acknowledge the personality of God. Some Earl of Bridgewater, thinking it better late than never, has provided for it in his will. It is a sad mistake.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“We have no higher life that is really apart from other people. It is by imagining them that our personality is built up; to be without the power of imagining them is to be a low-grade idiot.”
—Charles Horton Cooley (1864–1929)
“Poetry is not a turning loose of emotion, but an escape from emotion; it is not the expression of personality, but an escape from personality. But, of course, only those who have personality and emotions know what it means to want to escape from these things.”
—T.S. (Thomas Stearns)