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Editorial Review Product Description
In her remarkable new book, Alison Weir recounts one of the greatest love stories of medieval England. It is the extraordinary tale of an exceptional woman, Katherine Swynford, who became first the mistress and later the wife of John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster.
Katherine Swynford’s charismatic lover was one of the most powerful princes of the 14th century, the effective ruler of England behind the throne of his father Edward III in his declining years, and during the minority of his nephew, Richard ll. Katherine herself was enigmatic and intriguing, renowned for her beauty, and regarded by some as dangerous. Her existence was played out against the backdrop of court life at the height of the age of chivalry and she knew most of the great figures of the time — including her brother-in-law, Geoffrey Chaucer. She lived through much of the Hundred Years War, the Black Death, and the Peasants’ Revolt. She knew loss, adversity, and heartbreak, and she survived them all triumphantly. Although Katherine’s story provides unique insights into the life of a medieval woman, she was far from typical in that age. She was an important person in her own right, a woman who had remarkable opportunities, made her own choices, flouted convention, and took control of her own destiny — even of her own public image.
Weir brilliantly retrieves Katherine Swynford from the footnotes of history and gives her life and breath again. Perhaps the most dynastically important woman within the English monarchy, she was the mother of the Beauforts and through them the ancestress of the Yorkist kings, the Tudors, the Stuarts, and every other sovereign since — a legacy that has shaped the history of Britain. ... Read more Customer Reviews (41) 
Terriic read
I'd read one book about Katherine Swynford, and wanted to learn more.This book was excellent: well documented and interesting.
Genealogy and period interest
This book is very well written, informative, and especially good for those seeking genealogical information associated with the aristocracy of the time. While the main character is the thematic source, she is surrounded by the history and people of the time. I found the book very entertaining as well as a good reference for personal genealogical interests.
It's okay, but I learnt nothing new.
It was always going to be hard to write a book about a woman largely forgotten by history. Obviously I don't mean that literally, but rather the sheer lack of evidence of her existence is enough to make anyone shy away from Katherine as a topic for a non-fiction historical book. Alison Weir has yet again chosen a 'heroine' of history, a woman vilified by the public at large for questionable moral scruples and who on several occasions has been the victim of character assassination. Presenting the facts, or lack thereof, Weir has come up with some logical and at other times questionable conclusions as to the life of this fascinating woman.
This book has been reviewed several times already and so I will only rehash the basics. Weir has looked through history and found anything and everything to do with Katherine Swynford and like any historian has tried to piece the puzzle pieces together. She relies heavily on John of Gaunt's records, as well she should, afterall, Katherine was his mistress for a quarter of a century, eventually becoming his wife and the Duchess of Lancaster, thus it is only natural that she would be mentioned in varying degrees in his records. However, it is important to note that although interesting, reliance on a single source above all others can severely impact ones bias and objectivity. Having said that, the records of John of Gaunt practically hold the only surviving accounts of Katherine Swynford, and so you can see how anyone attempting to write about her life will have a difficult time.
I think Alison Weir has done a fairly okay job here. With the limitations she faced, she has managed to write a fairly readable account of Katherine's life, filling in the blanks as much as possible. Of course, most of her theories are unsubstantiated, but at the same time, they quite probably never will be, and so any biography of Katherine Swynford must be taken with a grain of salt. One can only surmise, and fill in the blanks with likely scenarios, basing those opinions on what is known about the period and the role of women of her particular status. I am no historian, nor do I know a great deal about Katherine's life, thus I cannot argue for or against the evidence provided, however I can say that for better or worse, of all Weir's non-fictional works, I have found this one to be the most interesting, accessible and attention-grabbing.
Thus, for this reader, this book is a solid 3.5 stars, it is interesting and readable, yet I learnt nothing new and I have read better.
Shadowy but significant historical character
Although I have an MA in ancient history, I have to admit that I actually became interested in this era when I read some murder mysteries by Candice Robb, The Cross-Legged Knight, that were set in it.I was so taken by the historical characters and the social background to the fictional story that I decided to follow up on some of them.This led me to books on Edward III, the Black Prince, Isabella, Roger Mortimer, and others.In following up the threads leading from book to book, I discovered some of those by Alison Weir.
Alison Weir's works illuminate some of the lives of influential women.While one might label her a "feminist" historian, and some have, the wise reader will look upon her with a respectful attitude as one who has filled in the "blank spaces" left by earlier, predominantly male historians who seem to see no place for women in history--to read some histories of ancient Greece is to suspect that there were no women in Greece.To some extent this oversight arises because of a lack of documentation with respect to women at all levels of society in some periods and cultures; it's simply difficult to get at their lives.This doesn't mean, however, that we shouldn't make every attempt to learn about them and their effect on the history of their time.Trying to explain some of the events of the Plantagenet rulers, for instance, would be totally impossible without referral to the character and behavior of Eleanor of Aquitaine: A Life (Ballantine Reader's Circle).Similarly an understanding of the disastrous reign of Edward II needs a good close look at the life of his queen, Queen Isabella: Treachery, Adultery, and Murder in Medieval England, while the lives of Richard II and of the War of the Roses is much forwarded by a look at the lives of some of the women present at that time in this and other volumes, as for instance The Wars of the Roses. By undertaking a study of these individuals the author has filled important lacunae, making far clearer the realities of the times in which these women lived.
Mistress of the Monarchy, the biography of Lady Katherine Swynford, must have been a difficult one to write.There is apparently little documentation, but what there is was well used.The author is reduced to almost continual inference with respect to much of the lady's life, drawing out of basic knowledge of the period, its architecture, land tenure, economic structure, etc. what she can to illuminate what her subject's life may well have been where there is no actual information.While I'm not always satisfied with some of her deductions, I am able to follow thelogic and have to agree that many of her observations are probably correct.My main complaint is that because of this dearth of information, Katherine comes out as a somewhat "soft," "shadowy" character hovering in the background.I'm not sure that this is because she was as mild and gentle as she seems or because we don't know enough about her to paint her in a more realistic light.The story comes across as very nearly a romance, but it is very definitely a realistic romance.It partakes something of the sense of time and the reality in time that the play Into the Woods by Steven Sondheim does.The latter is something of an adult fairy tale, because it points out the importance of time in "happily ever after" by revealing what happens after the "happy ending."It's one of my favorite plays for this reason.
In reading this and other histories, I find my story-telling self trying to identify the "good guys" and the "bad guys."I'm forever trying to root for the "righteous," a very modern concept and not a very realistic one at any time, all things considered.Although Katherine as a character is written with a great deal of sympathy by Ms Weir, there are points where her behavior is characteristic of her age--that is to say not nice--as when she ignores the issues with the locals in Lincoln over her enclosure of property and her unwillingness to clear a canal on her property.However, when put into the perspective of the behavior of the period, she definitely comes out the "heroine" of the piece, since everyone else is so much worse.More than anything else, the reader comes away with a very clear understanding of what happens when everyone in society simply looks only to their personal good.It reminds me of Matt Ridley's The Red Queen: Sex and the Evolution of Human Nature, which explains why so much inevitably goes wrong despite the fact that everyone knows it will if they pursue their present course, and of Jered Diamond's COLLAPSE: How Societies Chose to Fail or Succeed which points up different historical outcomes for alternative societal decisions.I just wished we'd "get the point" of these histories, because modern society is not immune to the evil outcomes of the same types of behaviors.
For those of you with an interest in Medieval History, this is the period of Edward III, the Black Prince, and John of Gaunt; a very "active" period in English history and one that sets the stage for an even more active period during the War of the Roses that follows it.Reading piecemeal about the period as I have so far, I found that some of the politics of the era seemed haphazard and confusing--certainly the recurrent use of titles as opposed to personal names makes it seem so.In reading this book the issues that arose at the end of Richard II's reign made much greater sense.Katherine and her liaison with John of Gaunt, which produced a number of "bastard" children related to the royal house, created a sea of cross currents in personal and national history, a sort of "perfect storm" situation, that didn't resolve itself again until the death of Richard III and the ascension of Henry Tudor as Henry VII.
Illuminating.
This book is more about John of Gaunt than Katherine Swynford
I was really looking forward to reading this book. I read Anya Seton's historical novel of Katherine Swynford years ago and really enjoyed it. I was hoping to discover a lot more about Katherine and her life. Unfortunately that wasn't the case.
Almost nothing is known about Katherine Swynford. Her mother is unknown, as well as when she was born. No one knows exactly how many children she had and their birthdates. The only solid records of her are John of Gaunt's (her lover and then 2nd husband) household registers for a few years that record gifts he made to her and a few historical documents. One granting the Pope's dispensation that Katherine and John were allowed to marry, another making her children by John of Gaunt legitimate after they married, and one from John of Gaunt himself in regard to Katherine's property.
Most of the time her whereabouts and what she was doing at the time are nothing but pure speculation. Even contemporary resources are of little help because they don't even agree on dates or events. Many of these sources didn't like Katherine because she was John of Gaunt's mistress and a "fallen woman", so they were probably biased against her.
This book really isn't about Katherine Swynford, it's about all the famous people that she had connections with at the time. Her lover and then husband, John of Gaunt, the Duke of Lancaster, Geoffrey Chaucer (he wrote The Canterbury Tales) who married her sister Phillipa, the kings, queens and other royalty of the time, etc. If you condense all the information that is actually about Katherine herself, it might cover a few pages, less than 5% of the book. I would say this is more a biography of John of Gaunt than anyone else.
I enjoyed reading it, because it was interesting, but it shouldn't be called a biography of Katherine Swynford.
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