"In this intimate account of a remarkable national transformation, Susan Watkins relates the extraordinary tale of how Queen Elizabeth I set out to capture the hearts of her people. In plays and pageants, in cameos and medallions and portraits, in the great country houses, their interior furnishings and their gardens, the royal image was specifically tailored to evoke devotion. To love Elizabeth was to love England, and the Queen personified both an era and a national style.
"It had begun precariously: the birth of Elizabeth instead of a male heir was a bitter disappointment to Henry VIII and his second wife, Anne Boleyn. Susan Watkins paints a brilliant picture of young Elizabeth's life, punctuated by conspiracies, and endangered during the period of rule by her Catholic half-sister, Mary, whom she succeeded in 1558. It gave her an enduring sense that to remain on the throne she must encourage the love of her people.
"The author skillfully recreates court life, in the palaces along the Thames from Greenwich to Windsor, and the nearly sixty royal houses that were Elizabeth's inheritance. An important part of the spectacle was the royal progress to the great country houses of her subjects. An Elizabethan house was not just an architectural achievement; it was often the literal embodiment of a relationship with the monarch.
"Throughout, the inspired photographs by Mark Fiennes, together with portraits, paintings, tapestries and personal objects, give the perfect visual expression of the nation's evolving love affair with its queen. Little wonder that Elizabeth's personality captivates the imaginations of Hollywood and of the tens of thousands of visitors to the surviving monuments of her era."
This is another non-fiction work that I picked up while bored at work. I've always been interested in this period and thought this book might be an interesting read. The pictures were WONDERFUL and they really enhanced my appreciation of the information. They were meshed together well and made the book a whole lot more fascinating. So, overall, I enjoyed this book for what it was: a non-fiction work on Queen Elizabeth I.
However, this book had a tendency to drag on a bit. The paragraphs and sentences were SO long. This made it difficult to find a point where I could put it down for a while and easily pick it up again--that is, if I didn't want to wait until I reached the end of the chapter. Also, the information sometimes jumped around from subject to subject (literally subject to subject...it went from favored man to favored man throughout Elizabeth's reign). It sometimes went back and forth so often that I forgot which lord I was reading about. This was a little bit unfortunate, though it didn't kill the work for me.
If you take it for what it is, it's not a bad non-fiction book. It kept me interested and the descriptions were fascinating.
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