Aristocrats

Really good nonfiction about 4 wealthy sisters who lived in the 1700-1800s. They wrote many, many letters that Tillyard combs through to paint a picture of their lives. I always love reading about how women lived in other eras so this book was pretty interesting to me. Lots of info about marriage, child-bearing and rearing, love affairs, and politics. Obviously, not a look into "everyday" life as these women were very privileged, and it doesn't go much into daily things like food, clothing, comforts, but I found it interesting overall. This was written in 1994 and I gather it was an earlier example of historical writing focused on women in a narrative way.

This takes the lives of a family, concentrating on the four sisters, as a biography of both a family and a time. The correspondence between the family forms the core of the research, with events being shown by way of how they affected the family and how they were recorded in their letters. As individuals, they certainly got up to quite a lot. Caroline eloped and married a man 15 years older than her, Emily had an affair and married her children's tutor, Sarah managed to get into more romantic tangles than you'd have thought possible, but did eventually marry someone she loved, Louisa was, in that regard, the odd one out, being married but the once and with the family's approval.
The many children of the sisters are also discussed, with show more the political careers and involvement in the Irish uprising being two notable events that they were involved in on various sides.
At one level, the correspondence is about the little things in life, the day to day of being a sister, wife and mother; at another level, it's a fascinating window onto events where they are close to the main players. The mixture of the two makes them seem very real, and the sentiment can be read as being very modern (apart from the language used).
It gets a tad confusing when there are multiple people with the same first name, even within one family, but the author makes an effort to explain who is who as it moves along. At times there seemed to be quite long gaps in the narrative, so we skip from the Irish uprising to the early 1800s with the turn of a page, but that would be a minor quibble. If you're at all interested in social history, this is a very good read. show less

I remember seeing the Aristocrats movie on Masterpiece Theater, and I really enjoyed it. However, I'm one of these people who say that if you liked the movie, you ought to check out the book - and that is absolutely true here. This book spans almost an entire century of history through the lives of four sisters who in their own ways played significant roles in English (and UK) society.

This is a portrait primarily of four sisters -- Caroline, Emily, Louisa and Sarah Lennox -- who were the great-granddaughters of Charles II of England and a French noblewoman who became his mistress (and whose son was named Duke of Richmond). The stories of their lives becomes a history of England and Ireland in the second half of the eighteenth century and the turn of the nineteenth. One sister married Henry Fox and was the mother to Charles Fox, both prominent politicians. One sister bore 22 children (!). One sister was wooed by the future George III. Later in her life that same sister divorced, a rare and scandalous occurrence at that time. During most of their lives they were writing to each other and those letters, along with a show more wonderful job of placing the sisters and their progeny in the context of their times, make for a wonderful book. It's also a nice corrective to all the Regency romances out there that give the impression that women had a lot more say in their lives at this moment of history. Even wealthy, aristocratic women had to navigate carefully and choose wisely in their husbands -- if they were allowed to choose at all. show less

Aristocrats is a biography of the four Lennox sisters - Caroline, Emily, Sarah and Louisa, the daughters of the second Duke of Richmond, and prominent members of the nobility in eighteenth century England and Ireland. One married a duke and later an impoverished tutor, and had twenty two children; one married one of the most famous politicians of the eighteenth century; one married the richest man in Ireland; one divorced a baronet, and ended up happily married to an impoverished Scottish soldier. All four of them had extraordinary lives.

In her well-written narrative, Tillyard manages to balance the sensationalism and the drama of the lives of the sisters and their vast extended family with a sensative and objective examination of their show more personalities and of the times in which they live. The experiences of the four women, their marriages and their travels, also allow her to explore issues such as the role of women in that period, and the complicated relationship between Ireland and England. The research is, for the most part, impeccable, and she manages to summarise the confused and confusing events of the '98 Rebellion with clarity and succinctness. The only mistake I could only really see was her description of Tipperary as being a neighbouring county to Kildare, when they are in fact separated by Laois; references to King's, Queen's and Londonderry county also irked me, but I fully own to the fact that that is more because of my own little tics and biases than because of inaccuracy. Highly recommended show less

Exceptionally accomplished piece of narrative history about the lives of four of the Lennox sisters in 18th century England. Although based on substantial archival research, it wears this lightly; this is not an academic work with full references. Those who have seen the TV series made from it will have glimpsed some of its qualities; but that missed some of the best bits, for example the extensive descriptions of the physical milieux in which life was conducted at that time, which are beautifully written.

Wow that was great fun. Tillyard does a terrific job of telling the stories of the lives of the Lennox sisters. The lives are eventful and full of human drama and historical interest. The book is absorbing and very entertaining but its not dumbed down or oversimplified. One little knitpicky detail, there are passages in French without translations in the text or in footnotes. I can read French but in this day and age I don't think its fair to assume that all readers - even all readers of an 18th century history - will be able to do so. Still, that's knitpicking. Highly recommended.