Elizabeth & Leicester: Power, Passion, Politics

by Sarah Gristwood

Book Overview

Few relationships fire our imagination like that of Elizabeth I and the Earl of Leicester, Robert Dudley—the love affair immortalized in Philippa Gregory’s The Virgin’s Lover —but nearly fifty years have passed since a book has been dedicated solely to their lifelong love. Soon after Elizabeth became queen she scandalized the royal court with her passionate obsession with the married Robert Dudley. When Dudley’s wife mysteriously died two years later,...

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0670018287
• ISBN13: 9780670018284
• Release Date: November 2007
• Publisher: Viking Books
• Length: 407 Pages
• Weight: 1.45 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.3" x 6.5" x 9.2"
• Age Range: 18 years and up
• Grade Range: Postsecondary and higher

Customer Reviews

Exciting and Compassionate

Sarah Gristwood's portrayal of the lifelong romance between Elizabeth and Leicester is intimate, chatty, highly interesting, highly entertaining. She is rather like an auntie clucking away in the background. over the escapades of a favorite niece. You feel she just loves Elizabeth, and Dudley too. But she gets them down to earth emotionally so you feel that inside they are no different from countless other men and women in love, on the rebound or even in remission. The long long relationship is spread before you in all its vicissitudes. Of course they were not ordinary but they had ordinary emotions. Elizabeth was Queen. Would Robert have loved her had she been a dairy maid? Not likely. She was the forbidden fruit he couldn't quite pluck although he tried all his life. Although his affection for her was undoubtedly very deep, I get the feeling he was not in love with her as a woman but as a symbol and personification of power he lusted to share. Was Elizabeth in love with him? Yes. She carefully saved his last letter to her sent just before he died in a little casket labeled "his last letter." There was only one "his" to Elizabeth Tudor. Leicester would have married her in a heartbeat, of course, but the reason the Queen did not marry Dudley was, Gristwood remarks simply, because she didn't want to. For whatever reason. (But she loved him). The book is rich in historical detail written with Gristwood's knack for taking you right to the event. For instance she describes what it would have been like for the four Dudley brothers, including Robert, imprisoned in the Tower after the ascension of Mary I. The young men were crammed together in one small area. The youngest brother, Guildford Dudley, the husband of Lady Jane Grey, was executed just outside the Tower precincts, and his three remaining brothers would have been able to see the bloody cart bringing back his body and head (as would Lady Jane herself). They would also have a bird's eye view of the beheading of Lady Jane, literally right under their window on Tower Green. They would have seen her groping for the block after she was blind-folded, they would have heard the thunk of the axe. This book is a woven tapestry of events and emotions and inter-relationships brought to you in stunning detail and with insight and compassion, too. Gristwood goes into a long discussion of the death of Leicester's wife, Amy Robsart, which has intrigued people down the ages. How could a young woman fall down a shallow set of stairs and thus break her neck and why did she send away all her servants to a local fair on that day? Was she planning to commit suicide because of Robert's defection to the Queen and due to the fact she possibly had cancer of the breast? Would anybody try and commit suicide in such a chancey way? Gristwood totally rules out the involvement of Robert in his wife's death, certainly this was no murder perpetrated by him. Some historians have pointed the finger at Cecil , but thi

really detailed historical info

I loved this book, its very detailed and goes into the real lives of the people, inculding their letters . If you love real history, not fiction, this is the book for you. Loved it. For real Tudor buffs!!!

Absolutely Fascinating!

Gives the account of the ever-interesting relationship between Elizabeth I and her Master of the Horse, Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester. If you love Elizabeth, you will LOVE this analysis on her famous, and sometimes infamous relationship. Very interesting section analyzing Amy Dudley's death and her possible murder/suicide/accidental death...

Nicely Written - Lots that was new to me

With the primary documents basically known and castles and historic sites fully documented, 21st century writers are providing general readers with more focus on specific aspects of Tudor history and more interpretation. Recently I've read : The Pirate Queen: Queen Elizabeth I, Her Pirate Adventurers, and the Dawn of Empire, Edward VI: The Lost King of England and After Elizabeth: The Rise of James of Scotland and the Struggle for the Throne of England These books, like this one, are devoted entirely to a particular aspect of a Tudor reign (or as in the case of one, the end of the Tudor reigns). Gristwood zeros in on the unique relationship of Elizabeth and Leicester who has been euphemistically called her "favorite". Griswold explores what this might be a euphemism for. There are lots of possibilities, but the author sticks with what is documented and what is credible. She also sticks with her focus, and brings in issues and people only as they relate to her main subject. I did not know of Leicester's role in sending Mary of Scotland her second husband, nor his role in Elizabeth's French flirtations. I knew of the death of his wife, Amy, but nothing of the other two women in his life. While I had assumed his motives in this royal romance, I never considered his emotional state as he waited for Elizabeth with whom he had shared the experiences of having a beheaded parent. Gristwood, who has obviously poured over every word related to these two as a couple, interprets her findings in a wonderfully readable way. I eagerly await the many more of these focused Tudor histories, that I presume are in the works. I'm guessing that the next generation of writing will provide more psychological analyis. Some of the topics are suggested by this book. They could be how the royals and their courtiers respond to the socially repressive dangers of the times or how their behavior or political posture results from the trauma in their respective families. One such interesting history could be a serious study of the Essex revolt through a psychological lens.

Interesting and Informative

Fun-to-read book about the romance of Elizabeth I and the Earl of Leicester. There seemed to be a lot of information compiled from many sources to make this a fascinating "tell-all" which is no small feat considering the limitations of digging up such old records which were often all but scarce. This book not only showed Queen Elizabeth I as a woman who could love, but also showed her intelligence in using her head as well as her heart to make her relationships work also to her advantage as queen and for love of her country and able to keep Leicester loyal to the crown until his death. The author did a great job.