Interestingly, this is the first time I've read a history book that's just about Elizabeth. Considering how much I've already read about her parents and their lives, I thought it was weird that I didn't actually know that much about Elizabeth's life after her parents died. This was a really good place to start.Alison Weir is probably my favorite historian - she doesn't make as many easily-disputable claims in her books, like Antonia Fraser, and her writing has clarity and a nice humorous touch that appears every so often. She also writes about these people and their lives like she was there the whole time. Do you know what the weather in London was like on the day Elizabeth was crowned? Alison Weir does. It's details like that that made me give this book five stars. For example, take this passage on Elizabeth's clothing:"Elizabeth I's wardrobe, which was rumored to contain more than three thousand gowns, became legendary during her lifetime, as her costumes grew even more flamboyant and fantastic....The Queen's portraits invariably show her in dresses of silk, velvet, taffeta, or cloth of gold, encrusted with real gems, countless pearls and sumptuous embroidery in silver or gold thread whilst her starched ruffs and stiff gauze collars grew even larger. Her favored colours were black, white, and silver, worn with transparent silver veils. Many gowns were embroidered with symbols and emblems such as roses, suns, rainbows, monsters, spiders, ears of wheat, mulberries, pomegranates or pansies, the flowers she loved best." Damn. My favorite part of the book is actually at the very end, and isn't even technically part of the book at all - think of it as a bonus track. After the epilogue and the eighteen-page bibliography and the three genealogical tables, Weir adds a delightfully spiteful article she wrote on movies about Elizabeth: which ones take the material seriously and still manage to be entertaining, and which ones make her want to tear her hair out. In case you're wondering, Weir likes the BBC miniseries with Helen Mirren as Elizabeth (I heartily agree), and she spits on anything with Cate Blanchett in it. Elizabeth "contained so many inaccuracies it would be impossible to list them all" (but she does anyway) and The Golden Age "is another historical travesty, made with only the sketchiest regard for the facts and little understanding of the period." I wonder if Alison Weir has ever watched that HBO series, The Tudors. Probably not. She'd probably throw something at the television five minutes into the first episode. I would pay to be able to watch something like that with Alison Weir. It'd be almost as fun as watching New Moon with Sherman Alexie.
Alison Weir is a master of historical narrative. This is a well written, comprehensive biography of Elizabeth I. The book begins with her Grandfather and quickly sets the stage through the reign of her father and siblings Edward and Mary. After the story of her childhood, the real story begins with the reign of her younger brother.Elizabeth's story is familiar in broad strokes - Bloody Mary, Mary Queen of Scots, the Spanish Armada, Shakespeare and the English Renaissance. Never the less, the details read like a spy novel, a romance, a treatise on civil government, religion and culture. From Sir Francis Drake raiding Spanish ships to Lord Essex at war in Ireland, the book covers her life and 45 year reign in style.I particularly like the way Weir quotes her sources in an authoritative manner without disrupting the flow of the narrative. In this way the book reads like historical fiction - which it is not. Weir is simply knowledgeable enough having done adequate research to re-create scenes dramatically with the words of her characters.Ultimately, there is little revolutionary in her point of view on Elizabeth. As a scholar, I don't think her research brings her to any new or shocking revelations though she clarifies and adds details to many points. Elizabeth was with little doubt a pivotal figure in the history of Europe and defining leader in the development of what was to become Great Britain. I suspect Weir's "The Life of Elizabeth I" is well on it's way to becoming a modern classic on the subject of the life of Elizabeth I. Well worth a read if you have any interest at all. This book is long, but quite accessible.
What do You think about The Life Of Elizabeth I (1999)?
I've always been interested in Tudor England. The time of Henry VIII and his children has really fascinated me and Elizabeth has always been the one I was most interested in (after her father, of course.) I wanted to read this book because I heard that Weir was very good. I wasn't disappointed.Weir presents us with a very young Queen. Elizabeth wasn't older than myself and she was asked to rule an entire country. What's more, she was a female in a world ruled by men. Her sister's reign had been
—Cassy
Just superb. As a long standing Elizabethan, reading this book has been a joy. Without a shadow of a doubt, the greatest English monarch and Alison Weir guides us through this golden time from under the oak tree at Hatfield Palace in 1558, to her passing at Richmond in 1603.The level of research of contemporary documents, state papers and the almost twenty pages of bibliography provide a most intimate and extraordinary insight into the reign of good Queen Bess. The author provides no Notes, but I didn't find that detracted at all from this biography. The detail is such, with each page containing quotations and original letters that 'Elizabeth the Queen' takes the reader back over four hundred years into her public and private life. Published back in 1998, I just wonder why it has taken me so long to finally read this book.N.B. Certainly not averse to a good conspiracy theory, and there are many from the sixteenth century, I notice that a certain American writer of fiction, Steve Berry has just had published by Hodder, a book entitled 'The King's Deception'. He purports that Elizabeth died c1543 and was replaced by a ten year old boy, who then performed a drag act for the next sixty years, unknown to the world. Please Mr Berry, stay over your side of the Atlantic where there are far more plausible conspiracy theories to be pursued.
—Pete daPixie
Talk about having a disfunctional family.Your Dad marries your Mom when he's still technically married to his first wife. No matter; your Dad is the King of England. Your Dad gets bored with your Mom and she looses her head (literally). You then go from princess to bastard and get sent away until your Dad likes you again. Your Dad remarries, and yet again a few more times. You cant help feeling a little insecure in such an unstable enviroment. You grow up loved and then hated then loved again. Your younger brother becomes King and he has a few ideas of his own about how you are supposed to pray to God. Your elder sister gets her turn being Queen and she isnt too keen on you or your religion either. Finally at last you get your turn at the helm and much to everyone's surprise and joy, you actually do a pretty good job. Just watch out for all those suitors asking for your hand or that nasty Spanish Armada coming your direction and how about that pesky Scotish Catholic Queen and cousin. She came for a visit and stayed twenty years, bad-mouthing you the entire time. Such is the exciting life of Elizabeth Tudor; Queen of England for 43 years.
—Manuel
