Marie-Anne-Catherine Quinault Marie-Anne-Catherine Quinault Marie-Anne-Catherine Quinault (26 August 1695 in Strasbourg – 1793 in Paris) (known as l'aînée) was a French singer and composer. Her father was the actor Jean Quinault (1656–1728), and her brother was Jean-Baptiste-Maurice Quinault, a singer, composer, and actor. She made her debut at the Paris Opera in 1709 in Jean-Baptiste Lully's "Bellérophon". She remained at the opera until 1713. In 1714 she began singing at the Comédie-Française, where she remained until 1722. Quinault composed motets for the Royal Chapel at the Palace of Versailles. For one of these motets she was awarded the first Order of Saint
Anne Hathaway (poem) of my widow's head/ as he held me upon that next best bed". In "The Second Best Bed and the Legacy of Anne Hathaway", Katherine Scheil describes it as "… [centering] on an intimate relationship between the Shakespeares and the second best bed: 'The bed we loved in was a spinning world / of forests, castles, torchlight, clifftops, seas / where he would dive for pearls' while 'In the other bed, the best, our guests dozed on, / dribbling their prose'". She sees Duffy's poem as belonging to a category of recent takes on Anne Hathaway that "… have used