The First Elizabeth

I read this back when I was in school along with a couple of this author's other works. I enjoyed this book nearly as much as I enjoyed her bio on Marie Antoinette. But that doesn't mean that this book is at all a bad read. While Ms. Erickson does speculate quite a bit, much like she did for her book about Anne Boleyn, the way she speculated helped to make this book a more real read, rather than just a dry book of various sources and excerpts and the like, but these looking for a more dry, factual read are advised to look elsewhere, this is more suited to people who like biographies with a more personal taste.

I was a bit skeptical about this book at first. On only the second page, Erickson refers to Anne Boleyn as having the marks of scrofula on her neck at her coronation. Now, this is something I have not read before. I've read about the mole, and possibily a goitre, but not scrofula, which is Tuberculosis in the neck lymph nodes. This lead me to be a bit skeptical of further information I might come across, but this was really the only startling thing. In fact, having read a lot about Elizabeth I, this book ended up being quite refreshing. There were lots of small facts mentioned about the way of live, the organizational nightmare of running a Court, the progresses, the fashions, even the details about the fitting of the Spanish Armada. It show more was not a dry read full of political maneuverings, but a more intimate look at how Elizabeth and those about her lived. However it did seem a bit rushed at the end. The Earl of Essex and his rise and fall don't take up much of the book at all, in fact the time from the triumph over the Spanish Armada to her death were covered very quickly. Well worth the read for some interesting gems of information. show less

We are shown Good Queen Bess and Gloriana not only from a modern perspective, but also through the eyes of her contemporaries, both peasants and princes, while the ladies, lords, servants and enemies that surrounded her, the sulky Earl of Leicester, shadowy Philip of Spain, steadfast but often frustrated William Cecil and the seductive Queen of Scots dance and plot and fight vividly across the page.

Oddly written. She seems to accept some rumors as true that many other biographies of Elizabeth discount, and she has odd detours into specific events which are not at all important. Yet she glosses over quite important events and only alludes to them in passing. Still, Elizabeth is always interesting, and it's certainly not the worst account of her.

A lavishly detailed account of the life and times of Elizabeth I of England, Erickson's book is a carefully researched gem. The book attempts to adequately portray the broad society and political backdrop against which Elizabeth reigned as well as the details of day-to-day life for the queen and her contemporaries and some sense of the personalities involved. Very nicely done.

First rate history of Elizabeth I.

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