Category Archives: Book Reviews

The Victorian Book Reviews 4: Serving Victoria: Life in the Royal Household by Kate Hubbard

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In most biographies of Queen Victoria, the ladies and gentlemen of the royal household are sources of information about the Queen and her court rather than individuals. Prominent courtiers including the royal children’s governess, Lady Sarah Lyttleton or the Queen’s closest confidante after the death of Prince Albert, Lady Augusta Bruce may be mentioned dozens of times in a study of the Queen without any sense of their personalities or private circumstances. In Serving Victoria: Life In The Royal Household, Kate Hubbard, author of Bess of Hardwick: A Story of Ambition and Excess in Elizabethan England and the historical novel, Rubies in the Snow: Diary of Russia’s Last Grand Duchess, 1911-1918, brings Queen Victoria’s household alive through the letters and diaries of the people who spent decades with the Queen.

Although Victoria was only eighteen when she became queen, she intended to change the nature of the royal household beyond recognition. During the reigns of Victoria’s uncles, George IV and William IV, there was little supervision. Ladies and gentlemen in waiting followed the royal example and pursued extramarital affairs. Courtiers invited their friends to dine at the King’s expense and enjoyed stipends and pensions out of proportion with their duties.

Victoria was determined to create a respectable household that reflected her own values and those of her middle class subjects. When Victoria married Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg in 1839, her new husband tackled the waste and inefficiency of the household, insisting that the Queen’s servants reuse the candles, wash the windows on both sides and stop providing free meals for their friends. The improvements made Albert unpopular with courtiers accustomed to the Hanoverian regime but saved the privy purse and civil list £25,000 per year.

For the ladies and gentlemen of Queen Victoria’s household, a respectable, efficient court was often a boring one. Contrary to popular belief, the young Queen was easily amused, content to spend her evenings doing needlework, playing parlour games or listening to piano recitals and gossip. Prince Albert attempted to raise the tone of conversation at court but Victoria did not feel comfortable engaging with artists and authors because of her own circumscribed education. For the household, evenings at court were long and uneventful.

After Albert died in 1861, the court became even more dull as the Queen went into deep mourning and outings to London and the theatre ended. Windsor Castle appeared to become a mausoleum to Albert’s memory and the entire household dreaded long visits to Balmoral, which Hubbard memorably compares to second rate boarding school with terrible food, cold rooms and unpopular compulsory activities.

In addition to revealing the daily lives of the ladies and gentlemen in waiting, Hubbard brings to life a side of Queen Victoria’s character that is rarely explored in conventional biographies: the Queen as an employer. Although Victoria suspended her public duties as a widow, she maintained a close watch on her household, taking a keen interest in her servants and attendants. While the Queen might send a reprimand to a lady-in-waiting who walked unchaperoned outside Windsor Castle or a gentleman who discussed a broken engagement in front of Princess Beatrice, whom she intended to keep unmarried, drunkenness and petty theft were largely tolerated. Some of the most interesting chapters of Hubbard’s book concern Queen Victoria’s intervention when a servant was found in a drunken stupor or accused of stealing one of her brooches. The Queen emerges as a complex mistress of her household who could be both severe and unusually forgiving depending on the circumstances.

Serving Victoria: Life In The Royal Household provides a vivid portrait of Queen Victoria’s court through the observations of the most prominent members of the royal household. The narrow focus on life in the Queen’s service reflects the insularity of the court, particularly in the decades following the death of Prince Albert. I hope that Hubbard will continue her research regarding royal service and write a second volume about how Victoria’s example shaped the courts of her daughters and granddaughters. Events in the outside world rarely altered the closed world of the Victorian court but the precedents set by the Queen influenced how future generations of royalty throughout Europe governed their households.

 

Paris Reborn: Napoleon III, Baron Haussmann, and The Quest to Build a Modern City by Stephane Kirkland (Review)

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Paris in the eighteenth century bore little resemblance to the romantic City of Light that attracts visitors from all over the world today. In 1749, the enlightenment author Voltaire turned a critical eye to his beloved city and wrote the essay “On The Beautification of Paris.” Voltaire observed, “We need public markets, fountains that actually give water, regular intersections, performance halls; we need to widen the narrow and filthy streets, uncover monuments that we cannot see and build new ones to be seen.” The crowded medieval neighbourhoods and shortage of clean drinking water threatened public health.

Readers of Victor Hugo’s classic novel, Les Miserables, and fans of the musical based on the novel will remember that narrow streets were also ideal places for revolutionaries to build barricades and oppose the government. In Paris Reborn: Napoléon III, Baron Haussmann, and the Quest to Build a Modern City, former architect and consultant Stephane Kirkland reveals how an Emperor and his appointed Prefect of the Seine created a new Paris that responded to the growth of industrialization and the birth of mass tourism.

The story of Baron Haussman’s radical changes to the Paris streetscape has been told in numerous other English language histories of the city such as Paris: The Biography of a City by Colin Jones and Seven Ages Of Paris by Alistair Horne. Paris Reborn stands out from all these previous works because Kirkland places Napoleon III (President 1848-1852, Emperor 1852-1870) rather than Hausmann at the centre of the book. Hausmann found creative ways to finance the building of grand avenues through the city and new buildings and public health initiatives but the the overarching idea for a new Paris was that of Napoleon III. The failings of the modern Paris, such as the destruction of historic neighborhoods and inadequacy of working class housing also reflected the Emperor’s limitations in the realm of urban design.

The displacement of 20% of the Parisian population during the Second Empire, the controversial destruction of medieval quarters and showcasing of a new Paris required the Emperor’s authority. Those who decried the loss of the old Paris blamed Haussman but the prefect was doing everything his power to create the city envisioned by Napoleon III.

The political career of Napoleon III is central to Paris Reborn but Kirkland fills his engaging account of the building of a new Paris with telling details about the various historical figures who lived in the Emperor’s capital or visited and left their impressions. Queen Victoria, visited Napoleon III and Empress Eugenie with Prince Albert and their two eldest children in the summer of 1855. While the Queen’s green parasol and enormous handbag embroidered with a poodle design could not compete with the fashions of the Empress Eugenie, her presence in Paris was an opportunity to showcase the new city and the legitimacy of the Second Empire.

European Royalty also descended on Paris for the 1867 Universal Exposition, marvelling at grand boulevards, high culture and technological innovations of Napoleon III’s Paris. The Viceroy of Egypt, Ismail Pasha, was so impressed by the performance of the opera bouffe by Jacques Offenbach, The Great Duchess of Gerolstein, that he attended the theatre every night during his stay in Paris. Victor Hugo acknowledged the need for Paris to introduce modern innovations but he decried the loss of so much of the medieval city. (Hugo’s famous 1831 novel The Hunchback of Notre-Dame celebrated Paris’s Gothic architecture). American author Mark Twain sardonically noted that the grand boulevards were perfect for firing a cannonball straight through a revolutionary barricade and the medical discoveries of Louis Pasteur inspired the rebuilding of the historic Hotel Dieu.

Paris Reborn: Napoléon III, Baron Haussmann, and the Quest to Build a Modern City is a well researched and beautifully written account of the building of Napoleon III’s Paris. Kirkland places the Emperor and his vision at the centre of the narrative and includes the perspectives of a diverse array of historical figures who all had their own expectations of the historic city and the rebuilding that occured in their lifetimes. I recommend Paris Reborn to anyone interested in nineteenth century royalty and/or birth of the modern Paris.

Harry: The People’s Prince by Chris Hutchins (Review)

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At the age of only twenty-eight, Prince Henry “Harry” of Wales, the younger son of the Prince of Wales and the late Diana, Princess of Wales has experienced a remarkable series of transformations in the popular imagination. At the age of twelve, he was the focus of public sympathy along his elder brother William as the two Princes walked behind their mother’s coffin to her funeral at Westminster Abbey. By the time he reached his gap year between Eton and Sandhurst, however, Harry was chastised in the press for his poor judgement compared to his seemingly more responsible brother. From his experimentation with marijuana to his inappropriate choice of Hallowe’en costume, Harry seemed to be a “party prince” alone without understanding of his responsibilities as a member of the royal family.

Harry’s reputation changed once more in recent years when he completed two tours of duty in Afghanistan and represented the queen on a highly successful trip to Belize, the Bahamas, Jamaica and Brazil. The Prince also served as an Olympic ambassador, following in the footsteps of his grandfather, the Duke of Edinburgh by promoting youth athletics. As Harry undertook royal duties, charitable work and active military service, even his “party prince” moments, such as his notorious game of strip billiards in Las Vegas, were treated indulgently by the public. In Harry: The People’s Prince, Chris Hutchins, author of Diana’s Nightmare – The Family and Fergie Confidential explains how the military was making of Harry, transforming him from Party Prince to People’s Prince.

The sections of Harry: The People’s Prince concerning Harry’s military service are the strongest chapters of the book. Hutchins combines the Prince’s extensive and occasionally controversial interviews about Afghanistan with quotes from his fellow soldiers and royal observers, giving a sense of Harry’s commitment to his military duties and daily life during his tours of duty. Hutchins also discusses Harry’s relationship with Chelsy Davy in more detail than previous works, revealing the full extent of her influence over key years in Harry’s life. Chelsy even edited Harry’s best man speech at Prince William’s wedding to Kate Middleton in 2011, removing jokes that might offend the Queen.

Unfortunately, these informative, interesting chapters do not appear until the second half of the book. In the same manner as Penny Junor in her recent biography of Prince William, Hutchins devotes far too much space to the breakdown of the marriage of the Prince and Princess of Wales. These marital difficulties have been analyzed extensively in other works and Hutchins contributes little to the reader’s understanding of his subject by reexamining them in minute detail in Harry: The People’s Prince.

Hutchins also omits vital historical context that is essential to understanding Harry’s military service and place in the royal family. The author focuses on the Prince’s admiration for military figures that he encountered during his childhood, such as Diana’s lover, James Hewitt (who was certainly not Harry’s father), with only passing mentions of Harry’s interest in “Granny’s soldiers.” The centuries old tradition of military service in the royal family would have as much if not more influence on Harry’s decision to attend Sandhurst than his childhood role models.

British monarchs led troops into battle until the mid eighteenth century and military service has long been accepted avenue for channeling the energies of a “party prince.” Readers of Harry: The People’s Prince should also read a work about royalty at war, such as Charles Carlton’s Royal Warriors: A Military History of the British Monarchy, to get a better sense of Harry’s place in the long tradition of royalty in the military.

The conclusion to Harry: The People’s Prince also displays an absence of historical context. Hutchins argues that the arrival of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge’s first child in July, 2013 will allow Harry the freedom to move to Africa, devote his energies to his Lesotho charity, Sentebale, and possibly rekindle his relationship with Chelsy Davy. The arrival of a niece or nephew certainly reduces the chances that Harry will one day become King, in the manner of other famous royal second sons such as Henry VIII, Charles I, George V or George VI.

The experiences of other younger royal children in recent decades, however, demonstrates that a lower place in line of succession does not result in freedom from royal duty. Princess Margaret faced pressure to end her relationship with the divorced Peter Townsend even after the births of her nephew and niece, Prince Charles and Princess Anne. All four of Queen Elizabeth II’s children perform extensive royal engagements both within the United Kingdom and throughout the commonwealth.

Harry’s very popularity may preclude a life of comparative obscurity abroad. Queen Elizabeth II, the Prince of Wales and Prince William will need “The People’s Prince” to continue his rapport with the public throughout all sixteen commonwealth realms. Harry: The People’s Prince is an interesting biography of a popular prince that would be improved by greater historical context for his military exploits and future, and less attention to the well known story of the Prince and Princess of Wales’ divorce.

The Tudor Book Reviews 12: Elizabeth of York: The Forgotten Tudor Queen by Amy Licence

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Elizabeth of York, consort of the founder of the Tudor dynasty, King Henry VII, is the least well known of the Tudor Queens. Both Henry and Elizabeth have been reduced to one dimensional stereotypes in the popular imagination: Henry the miser and Elizabeth the dutiful wife and mother whose image is the model for the queen on playing cards. In contrast, their son Henry VIII has been the subject of both scholarly analysis and popular biographies, which scrutinize all the known evidence concerning his personality, religious reforms, cultural patronage and his famous marriages.

Henry VIII’s six wives, Catherine of Aragon, Anne Boleyn, Jane Seymour, Anne of Cleves, Catherine Howard and Catherine Parr are the subjects of individual and collective studies that discuss them as private women and as queens. Many of Elizabeth of York’s grandchildren and great-grandchildren, such as Queen Mary I, Elizabeth I, Lady Jane Grey and Mary, Queen of Scots are iconic figures in their own right. In Elizabeth of York: The Forgotten Tudor Queen, Amy Licence, author of Anne Neville: Richard III’s Tragic Queen and In Bed with the Tudors brings the first Tudor queen out of obscurity, looking at Henry VII’s consort within the context of her times and discussing her role in establishing the legitimacy of the Tudor dynasty.

Throughout Elizabeth of York, Licence emphasizes the importance of viewing the Plantagenet princess and Tudor queen through the worldview of the late 15th century. Recent historical fiction featuring Elizabeth has speculated that the young princess was attracted to the power and personality of her uncle, Richard III, on the basis of an incomplete and no longer extant letter than might refer to any number of marriage plans for the King’s niece. Earlier speculation concerning Elizabeth imagined a romance with the future Henry VII, although it is unlikely that they met before he became King and their marriage was a foregone conclusion.

Licence reminds her readers that romance would have had little influence on Elizabeth’s choices or the choices that were made for her. As the eldest daughter of King Edward IV, her duty was to make a royal marriage that advanced the interests of her family. Once her Uncle, Richard III, seized the English throne in 1483, all Edward IV’s children were declared illegitimate and her brothers, the famous “Princes in the Tower” disappeared, it became all the more important that Elizabeth devote herself to restoring the fortunes of her mother and sisters. Drawing on scholarly studies such as Elizabeth of Yorkby Arlene Naylor Okerlund, Licence speculates that the princess may have served as a kind of spy for her mother, Elizabeth Woodville and future mother-in-law, Margaret Beaufort at the court of Richard III.

Licence’s discussion of the culture of late 15th century suggests some revealing conclusions about the major figures in Elizabeth’s life. The marriage between her parents, Edward IV and Elizabeth Woodville, took place in secret on the May Day, when the boundaries within the social hierarchy were temporarily set aside. The timing, secrecy and Edward IV’s rumoured history of going through some form of marriage with women who resisted his advances suggests that he may have planned initially to repudiate the union. Licence also looks at Richard III’s reputation during his reign, before the Tudors came to power, highlighting evidence that he was already rumoured to have murdered his nephews before he was killed at the Battle of Bosworth field in 1485.

The final chapter of Elizabeth of York is the strongest because the best documented year of the Queen’s life was the last one before she died of childbirth in 1503  at the age of 37. Elizabeth’s accounts in the last year of her life reveal an active queen consort whose reputation for charity and intercession tempered Henry VII’s perceived severity and frugality. Records of her religious donations and pilgrimages reveal a strong identification with the Virgin Mary as an intercessor and bereaved mother. Elizabeth’s devotions increased after the death of her eldest son Arthur and she and Henry VII appear to have been particularly united in the aftermath of this family tragedy.

As Queen, Elizabeth of York is less well documented than future generations of Tudor women but Amy Licence reveals hints of the personality behind the illustration on playing cards to a broad popular audience in Elizabeth of York: The Forgotten Tudor Queen. Elizabeth’s Yorkist ancestry, popularity with the English people and intercessory activities were crucial to establishing the Tudors as a legitimate dynasty during the reign of Henry VII>

The Tudor Book Reviews 11: The Creation of Anne Boleyn: A New Look At England’s Most Notorious Queen by Susan Bordo

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Anne Boleyn is the most famous of King Henry VIII’s six wives because every era creates their own version of her that best suits the times. Changing attitudes toward women over the centuries also changed Anne’s reputation. In The Creation of Anne Boleyn: A New Look at England’s Most Notorious Queen, feminist scholar Susan Bordo reveals just how little we know of Anne’s actual relationship with Henry VIII then provides as fascinating cultural history of the famous queen over the centuries.

In the reign of Mary I, the stepdaughter who blamed Anne for the collapse of her parents’ marriage, the queen was a scheming temptress, leading Henry VIII away from the papacy with her feminine wiles. In the reign of Anne’s daughter, Elizabeth I, Anne was reborn as the Protestant champion who brought much needed religious reform to England. This religious reputation persisted into the seventeenth century.

In the 19th century, much of the English public viewed Anne Boleyn as the innocent victim of Tudor tyranny similar to Lady Jane Grey. Jane Austen believed that Anne was indeed an innocent victim while Charles Dickens broke with prevailing wisdom to suggest that she might have been the author of her own demise. The historical novels of the 20th century introduced a new Anne Boleyn, the plucky, vivacious young woman who was destroyed by her ambition and her marriage to Henry VIII. In the 1969 film, Anne Of The Thousand Days, Anne openly challenges the King until the end of her life, suffering a marriage that ends disastrously because their passions only briefly overlap.

For the twenty-first century, historical novelist Philippa Gregory revived the old sixteenth century image of Anne the scheming temptress, stopping at nothing to achieve her ambitions in The Other Boleyn Girl. Meanwhile, actress Natalie Dormer portrayed an Anne who was intelligent as well as alluring in the Showtime series, The Tudors, an interpretation that has made Anne an inspiration to countless young women.

After Anne was executed in 1536, Henry VIII appears to have destroyed her letters to him as well as her portraits painted from life. As a result, much of what historians know about the relationship between Henry and Anne comes the dispatches of Eustace Chapuys, Holy Roman Emperor Charles V’s Ambassador to England. Chapuys was a strong supporter of Henry VIII’s first wife, Catherine of Aragon, his master’s Aunt, and inevitably described Anne in extremely negative terms. Despite the clear bias of Chapuys’ writings, Bordo reveals that they had a profound impact on future scholars and novelists alike, creating a received wisdom about Anne’s ambition, character and sexuality. Balanced and critical biographies, such as The Life and Death of Anne Boleyn: ‘The Most Happy’ by Eric Ives are comparatively few.

Bordo’s work stands out from all other scholarship about Anne Boleyn because she takes the popular influence of historical fiction seriously. Historians rarely engage with fictional portrayals of historical figures beyond the most famous works such as William Shakespeare’s plays.  Bordo’s research shows that so many aspects of Anne Boleyn’s life that the public believes it “knows” actually emerged from fictional accounts that became received wisdom.

One of the most fascinating aspects of Bordo’s work is her interviews with the various actresses who played Anne Boleyn over the decades including Geneviève Bujold from Anne Of The Thousand Days and Natalie Dormer from The Tudors. Both Bujold and Dormer did their own research about Anne Boleyn’s life and brought new insights to their portrayals of the famous queen. In contrast the cast of the 2008 film version of The Other Boleyn Girl appear to have been almost entirely ignorant of both the actual historical figures they portrayed and the nature of historical scholarship.

I highly recommend The Creation of Anne Boleyn: A New Look at England’s Most Notorious Queen to anyone interested in either the historical Anne Boleyn or the broader impact of popular culture and changing attitudes toward women on historical figures. I hope that additional books of this kind are written about other women in history with a significant modern pop culture presence including Empress Alexandra Feodorovna of Russia and her daughters and Anne Boleyn’s own daughter Elizabeth I.

The Medieval Book Reviews 7: Blood Sisters: The Women Behind the Wars of the Roses by Sarah Gristwood

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The Wars of the Roses or “The Cousins Wars” as they were known in the fifteenth century are a difficult period for any historian. The Latin monastic chronicles that described the main events of the Middle Ages were going out of style at this time and England did not yet have a strong tradition of secular historical writing. The surviving primary sources often contradict one another, resulting in wildly different interpretations of the same historical figures.

The current controversy about whether King Richard III was an honorable Prince who assumed the throne in 1483 for the good of England or a power hungry usurper who ordered the murder of his nephews may never be resolved because of the absence of key sources. The lives of the mothers, wives and daughters of the Princes who fought in the Wars of the Roses are even more difficult to reconstruct. In Blood Sisters: The Women Behind the Wars of the Roses, Sarah Gristwood, a journalist and author of Elizabeth & Leicester and Arbella: England’s Lost Queen pieces together both the political role of the women of the Wars of the Roses and the social history of women at court in fifteenth century England.

Gristwood looks at seven pivotal figures from Henry VI’s coming of age in 1437 to the ascension of Henry VIII in 1509. Henry VI’s wife Marguerite of Anjou came from a family of powerful Queens and noblewomen. Marguerite’s grandmother Yolande of Aragon, was a patron of Joan of Arc who influenced King Charles VII of France’s rise to power during the Hundred Years War. When Henry VI developed what would now be diagnosed as catatonic schizophrenia, Marguerite assumed a leadership role at his court but discovered that the English were hostile to foreign queens assuming power.

Cecily Neville was the matriarch of the House of York, wife of Richard, Duke of York and mother of King Edward IV and King Richard III. Despite her influence over her husband and sons and connections to other powerful figures of the period, she has never been the subject of a full biography. Cecily’s youngest daughter, Margaret of York, supported the her family’s ambitions from Burgundy. Her support for Yorkist claimants to the English throne threatened the legitimacy of Margaret Beaufort’s son, Henry VII. Margaret Beaufort was a senior member of the House of Lancaster in England. Following the birth of her son, Henry Tudor, at the age of thirteen, she was unable to have more children and became fiercely ambitious for her only child.

Elizabeth Woodville was an unlikely Queen of England, a Lancastrian widow with two sons who caught the eye of Edward IV. Gristwood reminds her readers that Elizabeth Woodville was not simply a commoner who had married above her station but a descendant of the ruling House of Luxembourg through her mother. The favour shown to her numerous relatives at court alienated Edward IV’s supporters including Anne Neville’s father, the Earl of Warwick. Despite first marrying Marguerite of Anjou’s only son Edward then becoming the consort of Richard III, Anne is the most under-documented figure in Gristwood’s book. Gristwood speculates that she was politically marginalized by Richard III, who assumed control over her extensive lands in the North of England.

Following the Battle of Bosworth field in 1485, the Houses of Lancaster and York were united through the wedding of Henry VII to Edward IV’s daughter Elizabeth of York. The first Tudor queen is often assumed to have been a passive figure but Gristwood analyzes evidence that Elizabeth had been raised to become a queen and attempted to shape her own destiny at the court of Richard III. Elizabeth of York appears to have exerted a profound a influence on her daughters, Queen Margaret of Scotland and Queen Mary of France and her younger son, King Henry VIII.

Through her comparative study of the seven most prominent women of the Wars of the Roses, Gristwood reveals the abrupt changes in the fortune that were typical for royal and aristocratic families of the period. Cecily Neville narrowly missed her opportunity to become queen when her husband Richard of York was killed in battle. Elizabeth Woodville’s eldest son was born in sanctuary but she regained her throne when Edward IV triumphed over Marguerite of Anjou. Margaret Beaufort was accused of treason during the reign of Richard III then became a respected councillor to her son, Henry VII.

Blood Sisters: The Women Behind the Wars of the Roses is a fascinating joint biography of seven of the most prominent women in fifteenth century England. Gristwood makes excellent use of the limited source material about the women behind the conflict that defined the last decades of Plantagenet rule in England. The leadership roles assumed by the wives, mother and daughters of England’s last Plantagenet Kings set precedents for the famous reigning queens of the Tudor dynasty, Mary I and Elizabeth I.

The Imperial Russian Book Reviews 5: Road to Ekaterinburg: Nicholas and Alexandra’s Daughters 1913-1918 by ECS Banks

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Emperor Nicholas II of Russia, his wife Empress Alexandra, their four daughters, Grand Duchesses Olga, Tatiana, Maria and Anastasia and their son, Grand Duke Alexei are one of the best documented ruling families in history. Historian Andrei Maylunas listed the multitude of source material concerning Russia’s last Imperial family in the introduction to A Lifelong Passion: Nicholas and Alexandra: Their Own Story. The Imperial couple and their children all kept diaries and engaged in extensive correspondence. They were photography enthusiasts who took more than 150,000 photographs of each other for their family albums. They appear in thirty hours of film footage showing both state occasions and family holidays.

As Russia’s ruling family, their movements were recorded by their security detail and their public appearances were covered by domestic and foreign journalists. After the Russian Revolutions of 1917 and the murder of Nicholas, Alexandra and their children in 1918, surviving relatives, courtiers and members of their household wrote memoirs in exile detailing their impressions of the Romanovs. In the 1990s, the excavation of the family’s mass grave outside the Ural mining town of Yekaterinburg provided yet more information about their lives and deaths.

Despite this wealth of source material, ECS Banks’ work, Road to Ekaterinburg: Nicholas and Alexandra’s Daughters 1913 – 1918 is the first book devoted to the daily lives of the four Grand Duchesses. In the numerous books about their parents, they are often reduced to broad stereotypes encapsulated by a remark once made by their Aunt Elisabeth, “It is Olga the Clever, Tatiana the Fair, Marie the Good, and Anastasia the Terror (reprinted in ed. Arturo Beeche, The Grand Duchesses: Daughters & Granddaughters of Russia’s Tsars, p. 159). The youth of the four Grand Duchesses at the time of their deaths (they were in their late teens and early twenties) also encourages portrayals of them as “children” who obeyed their parents without question and rarely expressed opinions of their own.

In contrast, Banks’s research reveals the growing independence of the Grand Duchesses between 1913 and 1918. While Nicholas and Alexandra wanted their daughters to have happy marriages like their own, they also expected them to marry royalty, as the Fundamental Laws governing the Imperial Family of Russia dictated. All four of their daughters, however, volunteered in hospitals during the First World War and developed attachments to ordinary Russian officers.

Eligible Princes and Grand Dukes seemed to make little impression on Nicholas II’s daughters. Olga appears to have barely noticed her first royal admirer, Prince Christopher of Greece and actively disliked the future King Carol II of Roumania. Nicholas II’s young cousin Grand Duke Dmitri was treated as an older brother by the Grand Duchesses and the awkward gestures of Grand Duke Konstantin’s younger sons did little to encourage the young women to see them as potential husbands. (For example, Olga wondered aloud what to do with the stag’s head that the young Prince Konstantin Konstantinovich sent her as a gift after one of his hunting trips). Instead of arranging illustrious marriages for Olga, Tatiana, Maria and Anastasia, Nicholas II found himself arranging marriages and military transfers for various ordinary Russian officers to end their friendships with his daughters, hoping that the next Prince might make a more favourable impression.

Banks structures her book as a day by day account of the lives of the Grand Duchesses. This approach has both strengths and weaknesses. It reveals just how much their lives changed with the advent of the First World War as summer holidays in the Crimea were replaced by full time work in military hospitals, then changed again when the family was placed under house arrest  in 1917. Describing the daily lives of the Grand Duchesses also provides a kind of social history of Nicholas II’s family and household, detailing the fashions, food and reading material of the Imperial residences.

Unfortunately, Banks’ structure also results in a lot of repetition. She states on numerous occasions that Alexandra did not like her daughters to have idle hands and that Olga was a mediocre tennis player because embroidery and tennis were quotidian activities for the Grand Duchesses. The book would also be improved by including more full dates, particularly in the pre-revolutionary chapters. Too many paragraphs in the early chapters begin with “The following day” or “On Wednesday” without including the month or day. Those who have read the extensive memoir literature and collections of documents concerning the Romanovs will recognize Banks’ sources but the absence of footnotes impedes use of the author’s extensive research by scholars.

By synthesizing the known source material about the daily lives of the Grand Duchesses and analyzing their reading material and cultural tastes, Banks uncovers the complex personalities of these young women and their emerging adult lives during the First World War and Russian Revolution in Road to Ekaterinburg: Nicholas and Alexandra’s Daughters 1913 – 1918. As Olga, Tatiana, Maria and Anastasia reached their teens and early twenties, their expectations gradually differed from those of their parents. The Romanovs remained a devoted family until the end of their lives but there is clear evidence that if they had survived the Russian Revolution and Civil War, the Grand Duchesses would have made their own choices about their marriages and futures.

The Deadly Sisterhood: A Story of Women, Power and Intrigue in the Italian Renaissance (Book Review)

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The great families of the Italian Renaissance are better known for the art and literature they commissioned and inspired than their own actions. The works of Michaelangelo, Da Vinci and Machiavelli have transcended the fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries but the members of the Medici, Sforza, Goganza, Este, Aragona and Borgia families were people of their time, navigating the complex power dynamics of the Italian states. To modern eyes, Renaissance noblewomen appear comparatively insignificant, remaining in their palatial residences while their fathers and brothers faced each other on the battlefield. In The Deadly Sisterhood: A story of Women, Power and Intrigue in the Italian Renaissance, Leonie Frieda brings eight of the most prominent noble ladies of the period to life, revealing just how important women and their connections were to the power and success of the Renaissance nobility.

Freida’s previous popular biography, Catherine de Medici: Renaissance Queen of France, examined the most famous example of an Italian Renaissance family increasing its prestige through an illustrious marriage. The eight central figures in The Deadly Sisterhood are either unknown to general audiences (Isabella d’Aragona and Beatrice d’Este) or have been reduced to villainous stereotypes in the popular imagination (Caterina Sforza and Lucrezia Borgia). Frieda challenges the legends that have emerged about Caterina and Lucrezia and presents all eight women as multifaceted individuals, raised to play influential roles in rival courts. Frieda looks at Italy’s most prominent Renaissance women together, presenting a story of rising and falling fortunes, lavish pageantry and last minute escapes that reads like a novel.

The late fourteenth century saw Italian noblewomen sharing a classical, humanist education with their brothers in addition to learning traditional feminine accomplishments such as dancing, music and needlework. As married women, many became patrons of artists and musicians in their right. Their lessons in rhetoric and reason were also useful because a noblewomen expected to reign as regent over her husband’s territories during his absences and persuade wavering supporters to remain loyal to the family. The understanding that noblewomen were capable of the same rigorous education provided for young men increased their status within their families and the expectations they faced as wives, mothers and regents.

At the centre of Frieda’s narrative are the controversial figures of Caterina Sforza and Lucretia Borgia. Caterina is most famous for a single episode in her life, refusing to hand over a key fortress to her late husband’s enemies who held her children as hostages. Her declaration that her children were expendable because she was pregnant and able to have more has been interpreted as a calculating bid for power at all costs. Frieda fills in the events that preceded Caterina’s capture of the fortress, revealing the danger to her entire family, including her children, if she did not find some means of persuading the rebels to retreat from Forli.

Frieda also places the entire Borgia family in context. Pope Alexander VI is famous as the corrupt figure whose excesses brought the Roman Catholic Church into disrepute. Frieda provides evidence that both the Pope and his daughter Lucretia shared a genuine piety that they separated from their worldly actions.

The Deadly Sisterhood: A story of Women, Power and Intrigue in the Italian Renaissance brings together eight of the most influential and powerful women of Renaissance Italy. Their marriages connected the most prominent families of the period and their actions helped their husbands and children to retain their places in the shifting political structure of the Italian states. The sack of Rome by troops commanded by Holy Roman Emperor Charles V in 1527, ended this unique period in history, reducing the opportunities for Italian noblewomen to rule states or command armies but the subsequent regencies of the Medici queens of France demonstrates that the tradition of female authority as educated wives and mothers continued in prominent Italian families for centuries.

Counting One’s Blessings: The Selected Letters of Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother edited by William Shawcross (Review)

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The life of Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother spanned the entire twentieth century. From her childhood on an Edwardian Scottish estate through her marriage as Duchess of York and Queen Consort to her fifty year widowhood after the death of King George VI, the Queen Mother was an enthusiastic letter writer. She corresponded with family and friends alike in a breezy, cheerful style, revealing her keen observations about her travels, the monarchy, world events and her social circle. William Shawcross, author of Queen Elizabeth: The Queen Mother: The Official Biography has selected the key letters from the Queen Mother’s surviving correspondence, placing them within the context of her life and times. Counting One’s Blessings: The Selected Letters Of Elizabeth The Queen Mother is an insightful and often entertaining account of a century of aristocratic and royal life through the eyes of one of the most beloved members of the royal family.

Shawcross intersperses Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon’s childhood letters with excerpts from her interviews with Eton College Provost Eric Anderson, which were recorded in the 1990s. The Queen Mother’s memories of how she and her eight surviving siblings “all liked each other tremendously” inform her letters about daily life in Glamis Castle and St. Paul’s Waldenbury. In a 1913 letter to her younger brother David at Eton, she wondered what Christmas gift to select for their elder brother Fergus because “It’s so awfully difficult to give a man something which he really likes, except guns and motors” then joked, “Good thought. I might send him a motor. Shall we give it between us? Only a few hundreds . . .”

The outbreak of the First World War was difficult for this united family as it meant the departure of Lady Elizabeth’s elder brothers for the front and constant worry about their safety. Fans of the television series Downton Abbey will find this period of the Queen Mother’s life particularly interesting as Glamis Castle became a convalescent home for during the First World War and Lady Elizabeth helped the patients with their correspondence and played cards with them in the evenings.

When Lady Elizabeth accepted the third marriage proposal from King George V’s second son, Prince Albert, Duke of York, her letters demonstrate that she had difficulty adjusting to public scrutiny that accompanied royal life. As the first British aristocrat to marry a senior member of the royal family since the seventeenth century, the new Duchess of York attracted attention from the press and public alike. She wrote to her former governess Beryl Poignand in 1923, “I did not have time to let you know I was engaged, before it was announced in the paper . . .I’ve had a ghastly time this week with reporters and photographers curse them, but hope they will very soon get tired of us.” Needless to say, concern about press intrusion into her family’s life remained a constant theme in her correspondence.

With the outbreak of the Second World War, Queen Elizabeth assumed an important political role, raising morale by visiting the East End during the Blitz and encouraging the women of the United Kingdom, British Dominions and Empire to contribute their skills to the war effort. Although the Queen questioned women’s participation in the workforce during the Great Depression, she was convinced of the necessity of women’s labour in wartime. Shawcross’s selections reveal Queen Elizabeth’s full contribution to the war effort as he provides the texts of her speeches as well as her wartime letters. In contrast to previous British royal consorts, Queen Elizabeth was present during King George VI’s weekly meetings with the Prime Minister, sharing her husband’s political duties.

Canadian readers will be particularly interested in how the Queen Mother’s correspondence demonstrates her enduring love of Canada and the Canadian people. Shawcross includes numerous letters from Queen Elizabeth to her daughter, Princess Elizabeth during her 1939 cross country Canadian tour with King George VI, praising the majestic scenery and friendly people. This correspondence also demonstrates Queen Elizabeth’s keen interest in Canadian affairs as she wrote about federal-provincial relations and French Canadian attitudes toward the monarchy along with her delight in landscapes that reminded her of her native Scotland. She maintained her interest in Canada throughout her widowhood. When Princess Margaret visited Canada in 1958, the Queen Mother wrote to her, “I have a feeling that Canada gives one a boost. . .do you agree? They are so nice, & so loving, and the Mounties are so beautiful & so romantic.”

The letters the Queen Mother wrote during her widowhood focus on her family and her travels. Prince Charles was a particular favourite and she described the events of his childhood in her letters. As the Prince grew older, the Queen Mother wrote to the Queen and Prince Philip with her thoughts about his upbringing and schooling. She maintained an extensive correspondence with her grandson while he completed his studies at Gordonstoun, Geelong, Cambridge and Aberystwyth, providing sympathy and understanding during difficult times. Prince Charles maintained a close relationship with his grandmother until her death at the age of 101 in 2002.

Counting One’s Blessings: The Selected Letters Of Elizabeth The Queen Mother is an essential addition to any royal library. The Queen Mother witnessed immense social and political change throughout the 20th century. Shawcross’s selections from her letters, diaries, speeches and interviews provide a unique window into the thoughts of a Lady, Duchess, Queen and Queen Mother throughout her long and fascinating life.

Gilded Lives, Fatal Voyage: Titanic’s First Class Passengers and Their World by Hugh Brewster (Review)

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When Lucy Sutherland was ten years old, Lillie Langtry dined at Government House on the Isle of Jersey. In 1873, Langtry was a local celebrity, the daughter of the Dean of Jersey who had attracted the attention of the Prince of Wales in London, become a royal mistress and was celebrated as one of the most beautiful women of the late nineteenth century. For the little girl from Guelph, Ontario, Canada who had lived in Jersey since her mother’s second marriage, Langtry’s visit to Government House was an event not to be missed.Lucy and her younger sister Elinor hid under a dressing table in the cloakroom to catch a glimpse of Langtry as she arrived at Government House.

The girls were impressed by her elegant white silk dress and Lucy would design her own gown for her first ball in the style of Lillie Langtry. The debutante gown was the first of many dresses designed by Lucy Sutherland. By the time she sailed on the Titanic in 1912 as Lady Duff Gordon, Lucy had become a celebrated couturier, designing dresses and lingerie for elite customers such as the Countess of Warwick, another one of the future Edward VII’s mistresses and Queen Victoria’s granddaughter Princess Alice of Albany. In the 1997 James Cameron film, Titanic, Rose describes Lady Duff Gordon anachronistically as “very popular with the royals.”

Like many of her fellow first class passengers on the Titanic, Lady Duff Gordon was a self made entrepreneur who had risen from humble circumstances to become a celebrated figure of the gilded age. In Gilded Lives, Fatal Voyage: The Titanic’s First-Class Passengers and Their World, Hugh Brewster brings the stories of Titanic’s first class passengers to life, revealing their circumstances at the time of the voyage and how the sinking of the “unsinkable” ship changed their lives forever.

Brewster is the author of numerous other books about the sinking of the Titanic including The Titanic Collection: Mementos of the Maiden Voyage. In Gilded Lives, Fatal Voyage, he observes that in most books about the Titanic, the ship itself is the central character, dwarfing the experiences of the passengers aboard. With a few exceptions, such as the famous Molly Brown, the individuals aboard the Titanic are subsumed by broad generalizations about the experiences of people who traveled in first class, second class or steerage. Brewster keeps the focus of the book firmly on the diverse collection of passengers who sailed in first class on the Titanic.

Aside from the financial means to purchase a first class ticket, the richest passengers aboard the Titanic had little in common. The thirty Canadians in first class came from a small business elite based in Toronto, Montreal and Ottawa. Among the wealthy American magnates, John Jacob Astor was solicitous of his pregnant wife Madelaine’s delicate health while Benjamin Guggenheim traveled with his mistress Ninette Aubart, who was discreetly lodged in a separate stateroom. Sir Cosmo and Lady Duff Gordon traveled under the pseudonyms “Mr. and Mrs. Morgan” so that Lucy could enjoy the voyage without being inundated with dress design requests from the other female first class passengers.

The first half of the book covers a lot of ground with Brewster balancing the events of the Titanic’s voyage before reaching the iceberg with the backgrounds of the first class passengers. All these themes come together once disaster strikes and the passengers struggle to come to terms with the enormity of the damage to the ship. Despite their different personal histories and traveling circumstances, the first class passengers shared a belief in human progress and viewed shipwrecks as events from a bygone age. This inability to grasp the magnitude of the disaster informed the decisions of the passengers at the time of sinking and during the subsequent inquest.

Brewster concludes with a detailed postscript about the lives of the Titanic’s survivors. Many experienced further hardship after losing loved ones during the sinking. For Lady Duff Gordon, prosperity ended with the sinking of the Titanic. Her testimony during the inquest attracted widespread criticism and changing fashion trends sharply reduced the demands for romantic gowns in the style of Lillie Langtry. For Titanic’s first class passengers, the sinking was the end of an era.