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Elizabeth

The Forgotten Years

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Elizabeth

By: John Guy
Narrated by: Alex Jennings
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Brought to you by Penguin.


An ageing queen, an heirless state, conspiracy all round: here is the court of Elizabeth I as never known before.

History has pictured Elizabeth I as Gloriana, an icon of strength and power -- and has focused on the early years of her reign. But in 1583, when Elizabeth is fifty, there is relentless plotting among her courtiers -- and still to come is the Spanish Armada and the execution of Mary, Queen of Scots. We have not, until now, had the full picture.

This gripping and vivid portrait of her life and times -- often told in her own words (and including details such as her love of chess and marzipan) -- reveals a woman who was insecure, human ('You know I am no morning woman'), and unpopular even with the men who fought for her. This is the real Elizabeth, for the first time.


© John Guy 2016 (P) Penguin Audio 2016

 Europe Great Britain Politics & Activism Renaissance Royalty England Middle Ages Tudor
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Critic reviews

A beautifully rounded portrait of both the woman and the queen . . . This is a masterful biography. (Amanda Foreman)
A gripping story of Queen Elizabeth's last years, authoritatively researched and engagingly recounted by the leading Tudor historian of our age (James Shapiro, author of 1599 and 1606)
One of the very best historians we have in the country . . . It is brilliant, vigorous history, and a triumph of storytelling and scholarship (Jessie Childs)
Guy's careful work with documents known and unknown, scattered throughout Europe's archives, allows him to paint a novel portrait of a complex - maybe even unknowable - queen (John Gallagher)
The best biography ever written of the Virgin Queen - a revisionist, sensitive, compelling, majestic masterwork that you can't put down (Simon Sebag-Montefiore)
John Guy's Elizabeth presents a beautifully rounded portrait of both the woman and the queen. Thanks to Guy's prodigious use of previously untapped material, we see, for the very first time, the full panoply of ambition and insecurity, plotting and deceit that marked the middle years of her reign. This is a masterful biography. (Amanda Foreman)
As you'd expect from John Guy, this is a very good read, a vivid and fascinating warts-and-all portrait of the ageing Elizabeth, backed by meticulous research (Claire Tomalin)
A gripping story of Queen Elizabeth's last years, authoritatively researched and engagingly recounted by the leading Tudor historian of our age. It will be of special interest to anyone interested in the political world in which Shakespeare's Elizabethan drama is steeped-from anxiety over royal succession to England's costly war in Ireland (James Shapiro, author of 1599 and 1606)
John Guy is arguably the world's leading expert on Tudor history. When he writes a book, especially this, his first on Elizabeth's life, it should be taken very seriously as having something new to say, and so it does ... a wonderful book and a magisterial account of the latter half of Elizabeth's reign that calmly reassesses every claim and myth by simply reading all the original manuscript correspondence. The result puts the record straight, but it also allows Guy to produce a pacy and compelling story (Jerry Brotton)
All stars
Most relevant
I have listened to this recording several times and it is so good. The subject matter, focusing on HMQ'S life post Armada, is a revelation to me. I have saved this to my favourites. i have the book as well and it is s riveting read. Alex Jennings narration, for me, cannot be faulted. The whole is an unalloyed pleasure.

Magnificent

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Listened in an unexpected three day Elizabeth-fest. Fascinating and hugely interesting. Particularly liked the discussions of early sources and biographies and how they had interpreted her motivations (and why) etc. Really well read by a narrator I know and like. I found it difficult to follow everything and occasionally had to go back and re listen to the beginning of a chapter. I should have taken more breaks but it was too interesting to do so. This saw me through severe winter weather days. Advice not to travel unless necessary was the perfect time to listen.

Engrossing - loved it.

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From the excellent narrator to content 5 ⭐️ cannot stop listening . Highly recommended if you love history told at its finest

Love it !

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All the bits that other books miss and some of the bits they don't. It makes you consider the dilemmas faced by Elizabeth and how she dealt with them. I feel that I now have a much better understanding of how the court worked and what Elizabeth 1 was really like. I thoroughly enjoyed every bit of this book and would not hesitate to recommend it.

Brilliant

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One of the most authoritative and detailed biographies of Elizabeth. I am not one of those who believes a biographer must side with or even like his/her subject. I think Elizabeth’s serious control freakery - built on her solid personal experiences of how so many people let her down - made the author sometimes quite impatient with her. However, it is clear that his research has been meticulous and his book is perhaps all the better for not being fawning.

I do think that he portrays a ruler beset with enemies in Europe and at home, who manages to steer a very pragmatic course through the last decades of her reign. Above all, it portrays woman who spent most of her life surrounded by danger coming through it all. The book’s last sentences that detail how frugal she was while maintaining financial assistance to allies and leaving her coffers slightly depleted after years of conflict with Spain and Ireland, and comparing that with how quickly within 10 years of peace, her successor virtually bankrupted the nation, show that while the author may not have liked her, he did admire her.

And the all-important narration is superlative.

Seriously splendid

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