The Royals and the British Aristocracy: Five Nonfiction Titles

Senior reference librarian, Rosemary Jerome, chooses five of her favorite nonfiction books about the British aristocracy that are on the shelves at  right now.

Helen Castor, She Wolves: The Women Who Ruled England Before Elizabeth  (2011)

Award-winning British historian and author of Blood and Roses.  Cambridge research fellow, Castor offers fascinating coverage of six powerful women who attempted without success to rule England before the coronation of Elizabeth I.  She explores the plight of Matilda--granddaughter of William the Conqueror, daughter of Henry I and mother of Henry II; Eleanor of Aquitaine consort of Henry II; Isabella of France who overthrew her husband Edward II; Margaret of Anjou; Jane Grey and Mary Tudor.

Deborah Mitford, Duchess of Devonshire, Wait for Me! Memoirs (2010)

The duchess is the youngest and last surviving of the Mitford sisters.  She is now 91 years old and she writes about her eccentric family and the British aristocracy. She was related to Winston Churchill’s wife, Clementine, and to Prime Minister Harold Macmillan. In 1938, she met her future husband, Andrew Cavendish and socialized with the Kennedys.  When her husband inherited his title, she became the mistress of Chatsworth; the Devonshire family estate dated back to the time of Henry VIII.

Michael Farquhar, Behind the Palace Doors:  Five Centuries of Sex, Adventure, Vice, Treachery and Folly From Royal Britain (2011)

Farquhar is a staff writer for the Washington Post and author of  A Treasury of Royal Scandals. Here he gives a well-researched popular retelling of some of the scandals that have plagued the British monarchy for over 500 years.  He chronicles marriages, betrayals, scandals and successes of the monarchs.

Linda Porter, Katherine the Queen:  The Remarkable Life of Katherine Parr, the Last Wife of Henry VIII   (2010)

Author of  The Myth of Bloody Mary. Katherine Parr was widowed twice when Henry asked her to marry him. Although she loved another man, swashbuckling Thomas Seymour, she agreed to marry the king.  She became a role model for princess Elizabeth. She also promoted religious reform and several literary projects.  Not long after Henry’s death in 1547 she married Seymour and in 1548 she died after giving birth.

Giles Tremlett, Catherine of Aragon: The Spanish Queen of Henry VIII  (2010)

The Madrid correspondent for the Guardians and author of Ghosts of Spain: Travels Through Spain and Its Silent Past. Tremlett approaches Catherine’s life from a Spanish perspective, he uses lesser-known primary sources from an ecclesiastical tribunal held in Zaragoza, Aragon, in 1531, to gather evidence on the validity of Catherine’s marriage to Henry VIII. The daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain, Catherine married Arthur, Prince of Wales; older brother of Henry VIII. His death a few weeks later left her stranded in England until she married King Henry VIII in 1509. Tremlett portrays her as a strong, well-educated woman whose tumultuous life was embroiled in Tudor-era politics.