An interesting account, but not what I expected...

The Lady of the Rivers

by Philippa Gregory

The Lady of the Rivers is the third installment in Philippa Gregory’s “Cousins War” series.  The protagonist, Jacquetta of Luxembourg, will be familiar to readers of this series as we encounter Jacquetta in The White Queen, the first installment of the series, which follows the life of Jacquetta’s oldest daughter Elizabeth Woodville, who marries Edward VI.  I know as I read The White Queen I found myself interested in this fascinating woman and was thrilled when I heard that Gregory planned to focus the third installment of the series on Jacquetta for the same reason.

The Cousins War, better known today as the Wars of the Roses, has not been an area of historical study for myself and therefore I find the fiction on this period truly engaging, as I don’t have the preconceived ideas about the personalities I encounter as I do when reading fiction focused on the Tudor era.  However, I am ever mindful that Gregory has cast women I know well, i.e. Anne Boleyn, in an unfair light and so I try not to become wholly sold by her descriptions. The Lady of the Rivers did pique my interest in Jacquetta and my attempts to uncover more detail about her have proved unsuccessful. Therefore I have to accept the character as portrayed by Gregory albeit with reservation.

The novel begins with a young Jacquetta at the court of Luxembourg discovering that she has been given the gift of foresight as a direct descendant of Melusina, a water-goddess, who married a mortal man and whose children founded the Luxembourg royal family.  In the White Queen much is made of this gift and Jacquetta seems familiar and comfortable with her abilities.  However, the Jacquetta as portrayed The Lady of the Rivers does not seem comfortable and confident with the gift and doesn’t seem to truly rely on her visions as the Jacquetta we encounter in The White Queen.  This is my main complaint about the novel.  Gregory introduces her reader to this character in the first installment but doesn’t stay true to her own portrayal in the third.  I found this unbelievably distracting and wondered if Gregory considered her audience to be blindly trusting and accepting of her portrayals and who lack the intelligence to recall the development of the character as portrayed by Gregory herself in an earlier novel within the same series!!  This annoyed me so much that I had to put it aside in order to finish the account, but really still it annoys me to no end!

We follow Jacquetta’s life through her first marriage to the Duke of Bedford, uncle to King Henry VI, and her second marriage to the Duke’s squire, Richard Woodville.  Jacquetta is in service at the English court to Margaret of Anjou, Henry VI’s French Queen, and Margaret is the focus of many of the novels more interesting plot lines.  Indeed, Margaret over powers Jacquetta in much of the novel and almost hijacks the story itself and gives another example of Gregory’s odd choices regarding the character development in this series.  I found myself thinking that perhaps Gregory is writing ahead rather than attending to the subject at hand.  Readers of The White Queen will find that Jacquetta overpowers her daughter Elizabeth, who is the book’s narrator and In Lady of the Rivers Jacquetta seems eclipsed by Margaret of Anjou.  I wouldn’t be surprised if Margaret makes a later appearance in this series, but whom will Gregory choose to eclipse the “she-wolf” of France?

This review qualifies for the following challenges:
Historical Fiction Book Review #14
Tudor Book Blog Reading Challenge #12

Before the Tudors II

The Red Queen by Philippa Gregory

The second installment in Gregory’s series on the women of the Wars of the Roses is The Red Queen, the story of Margaret Beaufort, the red rose of Lancaster.  I must admit I have never cared for Margaret Beaufort who I have always found to be the impetuous for much of the cruelty of Henry VII.  I have always thought an evil and vengeful women was hidden behind her religious habit but Gregory’s depiction, while not changing my option, has made me rethink the bases of those opinions. 

The story begins with Margaret as a nine-year-old child.  She is fervently religious often attending mass multiple times a day.  Her mother uses this devotion and schools her daughter to believe that it is God’s wish that she give birth to royalty and that this role was ordained from birth.  In turn, Margaret believes with the kind of faith belonging to the righteously devoted that fervently pursuing the violently contested crown is her birthright. She is told and believes from an early age that she is “especially favored by God” and she clings to this notion with unwavering conviction throughout her life. 

Since Margaret feels that God has selected her for this special honor she grows into an unyielding and ruthless crusader for her cause.  She will go to any length necessary to see her destiny fulfilled.  It is this ruthless scheming that has shaped my own opinion of Margaret Beaufort.  She is not a likeable character fictional or otherwise, but I am willing to consider that she was herself manipulated into this mindset.

Margaret is married the age of twelve to Edmund Tudor and nearly dies giving birth to her son Henry.  During the delivery the midwives ask Margaret’s mother if they should work to save the child or the mother; without hesitation she tells them the child.  Who could not feel sorry for this girl of thirteen who has just realized, while in the throws of physical agony, that her own mother values the life of potential heir, the hope of the Lancastrian’s, more than that of her own daughter.  I pondered myself while reading if this made Margaret into the woman she became, so fiercely dedicated to the child that nearly cost her life, but whose birth certainly took away what was left of the child within herself.  I would imagine that such an event at such a young age would have had an enormous impact on the psyche of any young girl and while the event as portrayed by Gregory is fictional as to the emotions it did serve to remind me to remember that the historical figures I have so long studied are human and therefore influenced by a myriad of encounters and events lost to time.  

While Gregory gives the reader some pause to understand Margaret’s indoctrination into her worldview from birth and that she herself was of little value in the quest for an heir.  Married while still a child and enduring a long and life-threatening birth seem to have firmed planted the idea of being chosen by God within Margaret.  This seed grows within her, as she becomes a selfish, self-centered and controlling woman with ruthless ambition.  Every moment of everyday seems consumed with the pursuit of the crown for her son.  

However, the reader must remember that Margaret was herself cruelly used.  Throughout her life she is unwanted, unimportant and unloved for herself.  She is the means to a greater end.  Margaret, through sheer force of character, inserts herself into her position otherwise she would be forgotten to time.  Despite being separated from her son for long periods of time they remain devoted to one another and she one of his most trusted and influential advisors.  Perhaps Margaret had to become self-serving to survive and remain an essential piece to an all male puzzle?  

Gregory puts Margaret as an essential co-conspirator in the disappearance of the Princes in the Tower.  This theory is certainly a possibility but is one amongst many.  Gregory does not attempt to humanize Margaret, but follows the most popular perspective of her.  There is no attempt to humanize or explain her actions and reactions, which would have been more interesting.  Perhaps Gregory found it impossible, but it certainly would have been an interesting take on a dynamic woman who remained influential throughout her life despite her sex. It would have been interesting if Gregory had pursued Margaret’s obsession with her son as compensation for her own life that was taken from her at such a young age so that he could live.  Perhaps Margaret’s sees Henry’s success as her own vindication?   

Margaret Beaufort and Elizabeth Woodville, of The White Queen, find themselves united begrudgingly but as survivors the allegiance becomes a necessary one.   Henry’s claim to the throne is a weak one, and despite Richard III’s declaration that the children of his brother and Elizabeth Woodville are illegitimate, the two adversaries find themselves allies through the marriage of their children.  Elizabeth of York, Edward and Elizabeth’s elder daughter, has a stronger claim to the throne, but because she is a woman it would be a contested claim.  These two mothers’ see that each needs the other for validation and by the marriage of Henry and Elizabeth the houses of Lancaster and York are united at last.

Indeed, Henry’s victory at Bosworth is reliant upon the aid of his stepfather, Thomas Stanley, who is notorious for his double dealing so that he is always on the side of the victor.  Fortunately for Henry Stanley’s forces watch the battle until it begins to turn in Tudor’s favor and then charge in on his side.  

All of my criticisms aside I still found The Red Queen an enjoyable read.  Also, though part of a series, neither novel is reliant on the other.  The next novel in the series is The Lady of the Rivers which is the story of Jacquetta, mother of Elizabeth Woodville, who I must say was the most interesting of the characters in either novel and so I look forward to reading that as well.  The Red Queen gives the reader the Margaret Beaufort that they would expect to find but is an enjoyable well written book.

This review qualifies for the following challenges:
Historical Fiction Book Review #6

Before the Tudors...

The White Queen by Philippa Gregory

First, I must admit that I am stepping out of my area of historical concentration I have long meant to discover more about England’s War of the Roses and especially Margaret Beaufort, mother of Henry VII.  However, Philippa Gregory begins her series on the women of the Wars with The White Queen.  

The white rose of Lancaster, is a commoner, Elizabeth Woodville, which I knew little about before reading this novel, but who certainly must be an interesting woman worth more investigation.  Elizabeth, as portrayed by Gregory, is dynamic and complex.  At the beginning of Edward’s reign, Elizabeth comes to the King with a financial dispute and wins his love by her refusal to be his mistress.  The novel in fact depicts the first encounter between the two as a violent one in which Edward attempted to force Elizabeth to have sex with him and she had to pull a knife out to defend herself.  Strange way to begin a relationship certainly, but stranger still was that Edward returned and married Elizabeth in secret which ultimately led to his estrangement from the Earl of Warwick, the Kingmaker and would continually haunt both of them throughout their lives and after Edward’s death. 

Elizabeth is portrayed as a political queen who seeks the promotion of her family with ruthless ambition.  Her mother, Jacquetta, who had served Margaret of Anjou, Henry VI’s now exiled Queen, aids Elizabeth in her political schemes with very unorthodox methods.  Jacquetta claims the women are descendants of the river goddess Melusina and both use this connection to the river goddess combined with witchcraft to influence events and curse enemies.

Elizabeth and her mother are safe while Edward IV remains in power but unexpectedly find themselves vulnerable when Edward IV dies young and unexpectedly.  Elizabeth with her mother and children flee into sanctuary at Westminster Abbey while Edward’s brother, Richard, Duke of Gloucester, named Lord Protector by Edward has control of Elizabeth’s son and heir to the throne Edward V.  Her younger son Richard is with her in sanctuary until she is forced to surrender him.  The Elizabeth that Gregory portrays would never surrender the last hope of the Yorkist cause into Richard’s hands, which adds to the mystery surrounding the Princes in the Tower.  Could a changeling have been substituted in Richard’s place while the true son and heir after his brother was hidden to perhaps reappear in the reign of Henry VII as Perkin Warbeck?  The story line is plausible if Elizabeth was anything like the worldly women Gregory portrays.  I would say we will never know, but since the bones of Richard himself have been found perhaps the boys thought to be the Princes, now buried at Westminster Abbey, will one day be exhumed for DNA testing.  While Gregory’s account is fiction, and she admits in her author’s note that more than any of her previous novels, The White Queen has the least amount of true historical fact because so little primary documentation exists, so enjoy it for what it is fiction with a tad of history. 

Perhaps this was the appeal for me of The White Queen.  Unlike Gregory’s novels regarding the Tudor era where I find myself unable to lose myself completely in the story because I disagree with her take on the historical record.  My reading of The White Queen was more pleasure based and thought provoking prompting me to delve further into the Wars of the Roses in both fact and historical fiction.

Overall I enjoyed The White Queen and found myself engrossed in the plots and schemes as a welcome break from the more romantic historical fiction.  I especially enjoyed the depiction of Elizabeth Woodville, a strong women navigating through the tumultuous upheaval of the Plantagenet era and eagerly await Gregory’s next installment in the series, The Red Queen, the story of another strong woman in a man’s world, Margaret Beaufort.

This review qualifies for the following challenges:
Historical Fiction Book Review #5