| This article is about Gabrielle de Lioncourt from the novel. You may be looking for Gabrielle de Lioncourt from the AMC adaptation. |
Gabrielle de Lioncourt is Lestat de Lioncourt's mother, a noblewoman of breeding and education, brought into the Blood by her own son in 1781 in Paris. A wanderer who dresses in male attire, she reappears occasionally in Lestat's life at his times of need, having originally parted ways with him in Cairo ten years after becoming a vampire.
She had yellow-blond hair like her son's, and cobalt blue eyes with "too small, too kittenish" features, as Lestat described them, that "made her look like a girl" as opposed to a woman.
Biography[]
Gabrielle came from a prosperous Italian family. She was educated and had traveled to and lived in many cities in Europe befoe she was married at a young age to Lestat's father, the Marquis d'Auvergne. Gabrielle gave birth to seven children, but only three survived. Out of these sons, the youngest (Lestat), was to become her favorite. She and Lestat shared a special bond: they both were trapped in a place they hated and struggling endlessly to escape.
Gabrielle was cold and seemingly uncaring, resentful of the role her gender had trapped her in. She was the only person who was educated and able to read, yet never taught her sons to read or write. Over the years she attempted to help her son Lestat, encouraging him to take up hunting and buying him his first rifle and dogs. She later said that she felt as though she lived through him; he was the male part of her. She suffered rapidly declining health due to bad winters and multiple childbirths, and eventually developed tuberculosis.
She funded Lestat's trip to Paris with his friend Nicolas de Lenfent by giving him one of her rings to sell and advising him to hitch a ride on the postal carriage, telling him that she is dying and wants to know he is happy in Paris before the end. Lestat exchanged letters with her frequently, and she encouraged his acting career, which gave him much strength and further confidence.
Lestat is made into a vampire by Magnus, and inherits near-inexhaustible wealth when Magnus killed himself. To hide the truth from Gabrielle, Lestat tells her tales of going to the Bahamas, marrying a rich woman and coming into vast wealth. Lestat puts together a plan to send Nicki out of Paris to take his mother to Italy before she dies, but finds that she has already come to see him in Paris, as her health has rapidly declined. Lestat goes to see his mother, attempting to hide the changes in him, but she sees upon closer inspection of Lestat's changed appearance that he has become a vampire. When Gabrielle begins to die right before his eyes, a desperate Lestat gives her the Dark Gift, making her his first fledgling.
Gabrielle realizes her son is no longer human.
Lestat takes Gabrielle hunting on the night of her transformation, and sees that his knowledge he gained about her when he transformed her and her new attitude as a vampire makes her no longer recognizable to him as his mother. He now sees her as simply Gabrielle, and the two's companionship blurs the lines of familial and romantic. Gabrielle quickly makes it apparent that she is different from Lestat in ways he has trouble understanding, having little interest in attempting to fit in with human society, and expressing a desire to travel to the wilderness and live in the jungles. Gabrielle chooses to begin dressing in men's clothes, cuts her hair, and is distraught to discover that it will regrow every night.
After Lestat and Gabrielle save Nicolas from Armand, Gabrielle warns Lestat against making him into a vampire. Seeing the transformed Nicolas shortly after, she refers to it as "disaster." Gabrielle is present at Magnus's tower when Lestat returns with Armand after their fight, and argues with Armand that all he has to offer them is information about vampires. Armand claims that the love Gabrielle has for Lestat is nothing compared to his own love for Lestat, and Gabrielle takes great offense. After hearing his story, Gabrielle has little affection for Armand, but suggests he join the Théâtre des Vampires while he finds a real sense of purpose.
Gabrielle leaves Paris with Lestat, but they grow less close over the course of their travels, the fundamental differences between them becoming more and more apparent. After receiving a letter telling her that her other sons and their children have all been killed and her husband has fled France for New Orleans, she conceals it from Lestat, feeling no obligation to her mortal family. When Lestat discovers the letter, it leads the two to part ways, as Lestat considers going to New Orleans and wants to more broadly see more of human civilization, whereas Gabrielle heads south from Cairo to Africa, intending to distance herself from humans as much as possible.
Gabrielle illustrated by O.J. Cariello in Queen of the Damned by Innovation Comics
Gabrielle does not reappear until 1985, when she shows up at the end of Lestat's concert and drives a getaway car as she, Lestat, and Louis flee from Akasha. Gabrielle is part of the group of vampires that gather at the Sonoma compound, where Gabrielle asks about the possibility of "smok[ing] the bitch" that kidnapped her son. Gabrielle joins the other vampires on Night Island, where she apparently gets along with Jesse Reeves.
Gabrielle occasionally appears throughout the series when Lestat is in trouble, as the two share a deep love and connection, but often are exasperated with each other or have different overall desires. Gabrielle watches over Lestat during his catatonic sleep in New Orleans after Memnoch the Devil, and argues with Armand when he attempts to approach Lestat in The Vampire Armand. In Prince Lestat, Gabrielle finds Lestat in his Château, and takes him to meet with Sevraine and the group of female vampires hiding in isolation to discuss The Voice. Gabrielle goes back to the Château with Lestat after he is named Prince at Trinity Gate, and appears to have become companions with Sevraine. In Blood Communion, she is the first of Lestat's loved ones to be captured and presumed murdered by Rhoshamandes, and is later found alive. At the ball at the close of the novel, she wears the court dress of a woman in 1780's France for Lestat's benefit, and he originally does not recognize her in women's clothes. She tells him, “I’ll be at your side until you tell me that you don’t want me.”
Gender[]
Although androgyny is a common theme in Rice's books, Gabrielle showed many behaviors that a common fan interpretation sees as implying she may fall under the definition of a non-binary or transmasculine identity. She referred to Lestat as her phallus, and lived her life through him. After Lestat made her into a vampire, he procured for her an extravagant dress to replace the blood and excrement stained one she died in. Only moments later, she killed a man, discarded the dress and took his clothing for herself, tucking her hair beneath a cap. Some time after, she cut her hair to a length more befitting a man, and was horrified the next night and shaken when she found it restored to its original length. As the story moved on, Lestat described her candor and comportment as that of a man, though her girlish facial traits kept her from carrying off the ruse successfully. He goes on to note that she only ever rarely donned dresses again, and that when such events did occur, they were only done to please him.
In an in-character Facebook post written by "Lestat,"[1] Anne Rice described Gabrielle's relationship to gender: "I can tell you how my mother, Gabrielle, responded once she became a vampire. She put aside women's garments and lived as a genderless being, ignoring society entirely and taking full possession of her superior vampiric strength with genderless impunity."
In Adaptations[]
Gabrielle has only appeared in the Broadway Musical Lestat played by Carolee Carmello who was nominated for a Tony Award for the part.
Gallery[]
Lestat (musical)[]
