Mata Hari was an erotic dancer who, in 1917, was executed by the French army for treason. She has been portrayed as the ultimate femme fatale, extracting information from hapless men through exploiting her sensual charms.

She was white, beautiful, and heterosexual, yet had to be punished for transgressing the boundaries of femininity.

Similar to many Evil Women, she was believed to be deceitful, rapacious, immoral, and controlling. She was lustful and, like a black widow spider, a threat to men everywhere.

A lecture by Joanna Bourke 11 February

The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website:

https://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/mata-hari

Gresham College has been giving free public lectures since 1597. This tradition continues today with all of our five or so public lectures a week being made available for free download from our website. There are currently over 2,000 lectures free to access or download from the website.

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