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Title: Mary, Queen of Scots and the Murder of Lord Darnley by Alison Weir ISBN: 0-345-43658-X Publisher: Ballantine Books Pub. Date: 01 April, 2003 Format: Hardcover Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $27.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 3.09 (11 reviews)
Rating: 3
Summary: Mary, Mary Quite Contrary
Comment: Alison Weir's "Mary Queen of Scots and the Murder of Lord Darnley" is not the best of her popular histories, but it is still a well-written, copiously researched piece that despite its length goes along at a brisk pace. Weir defends her decision to write a detailed set-up to the murder of Darnley from the outset, and does so in great detail, most of it truly pertinent to the case.
However, what it comes down to -- as it so often does with Mary -- is the question of the Casket Letters. Weir discounts their authenticity vehemently and exonorates Mary of any complicity in her husband's death. This begs the big issue of Mary's character as a ruthless schemer, brought up in Machiavellian France, losing her head over plots against Elizabeth. Weir makes a case here, but does not convince nor provide new interpretations of old evidence.
If you are a Marian, this book will add ample fuel to your fire. If you are not, the last sentence will make you gasp in righteous indignation.
Rating: 2
Summary: Mary won't make the Mensa Chapter of Monarchs!
Comment: Mary Queen of Scots was a tragic figure in the history of
emerging Reformation Europe. The tall and beautiful queen was raised in the luxurious French court where she was wed for the
first time. As a Stuart and Scot she became Queen of that misty
Scottish land in which John Knox and a band of nobles were in the proces of turning the kingdom from Roman Catholic to Presbyterian.
Mary married often but without luck. Her second husband who was English and a cousin of the redoubtable Elizbeth one was Lord Darnley. He was brutally murdered by a group of nobles eager to murder the Catholic Darnley, confine Mary to domesticity and use the young son of Mary James VI as a pawn in which to wield power in Reformation Europe.
Unanswered is whether Mary assisted the plot? Did she conspire with her third husband Bothwell (who was undoubtedly involved in the gunpowder plot which catapulted Darnley to Kingdom Come?)
Are the casket letters containing incriminating letters from Mary to Bothwell and others geniune proving her participation in the murder plot? Historians are divided on this issue as Weir
makes clear.
She asserts that Mary was more sinned against and was innocent in the murder of Darnley. She asserts that Mary was raped and wed by Bothwell (who would die in madness in a Danish prison) in
a power play for to become King of Scotland and eventually even
England.
None of the characters are attractive personalities. Mary was often impetuous and foolish (e.g.-she fled Scotland for England where her putative friend in female thronedom Elizabeth had her promptly tried and imprisoned and finally executed!).
Darnley was a stupid fop eager for sex and play in the fields and in the parlors of Scotland. Bothwell was a brutal bully and womanizer who was a "rotter" of the first magnitude!
The book is long and often is quite dull. It takes a detailed knowledge of who was who in Scotland and Europe at the time. The cast of plotting, corrupt and sinister figures is vast and almost
impossible to keep straight as one reads.
I have read all of Alison Weir's books and she is a reuptable popular historian. However I would advise the Amazon reader to order the more lucid biography on Mary by Lady Antonia Fraser.
The book is well researched; Weir knows her subject well but
to the nonspecialist in the time and characters she has trouble keeping an American reader interested in whatever happens to the puppets who parade their sanguinary passiona in this six hundred page opus.
Rating: 5
Summary: Excellent, well-researched
Comment: This is the best-researched and most definitive account of the centuries-long controversy over the murder of Lord Darnley. Ms. Weir convincingly lays down her case that Mary was probably not a murderer. For those interested in this period and in history, it is quite interesting indeed.
However, I do believe the reader from OC was overly harsh with Mary. She did have poor judgement with Darnley but she did show intelligence, balance, and staminia during her rule in Scotland. Her policy of allowing the Protestant revolution of just one year earlier, even her mother had fought against them, and it was against her own beliefs, was a deft move. She faced a revolt in her first year of rule by Lord Huntly and dealt with it well, securing the loyalty of the Lords very quickly. Additionally, she would not have married Darnley if she had been able to secure one of several continental matches (plus an English one), including Philip of Spain, but these were refused because Scotland was considered too small and poor a country to be important. Overall, that she managed to keep stability in Scotland for six years is quite impressive. The country was torn with strife and war for the decade preceding her arrival, and it was torn with strife and war for many decades following her deposition. None of the supposedly crafty Scottish Lords in this tale secured power for very long, and indeed most did not survive as long as Mary did.
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Title: Princes in the Tower by Alison Weir ISBN: 0345391780 Publisher: Ballantine Books Pub. Date: 10 July, 1995 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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Title: Eleanor of Aquitaine : A Life by Alison Weir ISBN: 0345434870 Publisher: Ballantine Books Pub. Date: 03 April, 2001 List Price(USD): $15.95 |
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Title: Wars of the Roses by Alison Weir ISBN: 0345404335 Publisher: Ballantine Books Pub. Date: 25 June, 1996 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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Title: The Life of Elizabeth I by Alison Weir ISBN: 0345425502 Publisher: Ballantine Books Pub. Date: 05 October, 1999 List Price(USD): $15.95 |
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Title: Children of Henry VIII by Alison Weir ISBN: 0345407865 Publisher: Ballantine Books Pub. Date: 08 July, 1997 List Price(USD): $15.00 |
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