Book Reviews
-
I was lucky enough to see this talk (click here for link) on Friday 9th May, in Lavenham. Philippa is so calm and knowledgeable. She answers queries politely and logically, even one asking her about the notorious Tracy Boorman ‘documentary’ (desperate fantasy more like!). She addresses this notorious documentary in the new edition of her…
-
“The Pretender” takes the same-old attitude to Richard III….
Oh dear… “….The year is 1483 and England is in peril. The much-despised Richard III [who has murdered the boys in the Tower] is not long for the throne, and the man who will become Henry VII stands poised to snatch the crown for himself. But for twelve-year-old John Collan [to be Lambert Simnel, the…
-
Ricardians know Josephine Tey’s 1951 novel The Daughter of Time too well by now for me to go into its plot too deeply. Suffice it that this was a landmark publication for the reputation of Richard III, whose name is cleared brilliantly by Tey’s hero, Alan Grant, a Scotland Yard police inspector who is laid…
-
Unwarranted praise for the first Lancastrian usurper….!
14th century England, absolute ruler, Agnes Lancecrona, Anne of Bohemia, Anne of Bohemia’s letter, constitutional monarch, Helen Castor, Henry IV, Isabella of Valois queen of Richard II, John of Gaunt, Kristen L Geaman, Lords Appellant, Peasants’ Revolt 1381, Richard II, Richard III, Sir Simon Burley, usurpation, Wenceslas IVPlease have patience with me now, because I’m about to remount yesterday’s hobby horse, but as it concerns the arrival of the usurping House of Lancaster on the throne of England, it’s relevant to Ricardians—by that I mean we supporters of Richard III. There are other Ricardians too, of course, and they are loyal to…
-
… and here it is, with many thanks to Tony Riches. Uncrowned features claimants from several centuries, including Jane, Edward V, Edward the Black Prince and Henry Frederick Stuart. Ashley Mantle is also the author of King John: A Brief History.
-
Here is Ashley Mantle‘s short biography of King John, as published in 2016 and available on Amazon. Is he the only English monarch to appear in a cartoon? Mantle’s next subject will be Henry I …
-
Caroline Burt and Richard Partington are prominent historians at the University of Cambridge, and have written a book entitled Arise, England, which “….is shaping up to be a welcome shelter from the permanent torrent of Tudors….” Oh, yippee! At last! I’m so sick of the Tudors, on all manner of levels, so a book about…
-
This is the second of Kathryn Warner’s books about Edward II, focussing on the life of his wife, who came across from France as the daughter, sister and aunt of the last five Capetian kings at the outset of the Hundred Years’ War, her niece being passed over as a Salic Law led to a…
The New Murrey and Blue blog 