Correcting the Record: On the Translation of Jeanne de Recqueville’s Biography
Once again, I feel compelled to respond to defamatory and baseless accusations being circulated online about my work—and about Jeanne de Recqueville.
My husband Renato Floris translated Jeanne de Recqueville’s rare French biography of Rudolph Valentino into English. This book, long out of print and almost impossible to find, was treated with the utmost scholarly respect. The translation was done meticulously, and the edition we published was intended to honor de Recqueville’s work and make it accessible to a wider audience for the first time.
We did not “appropriate” the book. We cited the original author. We did not “steal” the cover. The image used on the cover was fully licensed and paid for. The fact that we chose the same pose of Valentino as de Recqueville’s original edition was a deliberate tribute—an homage to her contribution to Valentino scholarship, not an act of theft.
To those falsely claiming otherwise: the facts are available. And I stand by our work. That a group moderator would threaten removal of anyone who mentions our edition is not only petty—it’s a troubling act of censorship in what should be a community interested in historical truth.
The only “appropriation” here is the hijacking of a legacy—Jeanne de Recqueville’s, Renato’s, and mine—by those who seek to control the narrative through lies, threats, and silencing tactics.
Let the record stand corrected.
