Synopses & Reviews
Margaret's exercise of power examined, its effects, and the opposition it created. Margaret of Anjou is the most notorious of English medieval queens. Shakespeare dramatised - and immortalised - her as the 'she-wolf whose vindictive spirit fuelled the fifteenth-century dynastic conflict, the Wars of the Roses. Although most histories acknowledge her key role in the struggle, their focus has remained upon its male protagonists, leaving Margaret's power largely unexamined. In a man's world, how did Margaret exercise power? Achieving political prominence through the illness of her husband, Henry VI, conventional contemporary ideas of her place as woman and queen defined the terms on which she could obtain and exercise power, conditions which she was forced to acknowledge: as a public figure, she invoked the authority of her husband or her son, for whom she was intermediary and intercessor, but her authority thus had always to be reasserted and renegotiated. Opposition to her also focused on her sex, portraying her as a sexual transgressor and using charges of private misconduct to support allegations of disorder in the wider realm. By considering the constraints imposed upon Margaret's involvement in political activity by virtue of being a woman, this book sheds new light on the convoluted politics of mid-fifteenth-century England and contributes to a clearer understanding of the conditions of female power in the later middle ages.
Synopsis
Margaret of Anjou was a vengeful and violent woman, or so we have been told, whose vindictive spirit fuelled the fifteenth-century dynastic conflict, the Wars of the Roses. In Shakespeare's rendering she becomes an adulterous queen who mocks her captive enemy, Richard, duke of York, before killing him in cold blood. Shakespeare's portrayal has proved to be remarkably resilient, because Margaret's queenship lends itself to such an assessment. In 1445, at the age of fifteen, she was married to the ineffectual Henry VI, a move expected to ensure peace with France and an heir to the throne. Eight years later, while she was in the later stages of her only pregnancy, Henry suffered a complete mental collapse that left him catatonic for roughly a year and a half: Margaret came to the political forefront. In the aftermath of the king's illness, she became an indefatigable leader of the Lancastrian loyalists in their struggle against their Yorkist opponents. Margaret's exercise of power was always fraught with difficulty: as a woman, her effective power was dependent upon her invocation of the authority of her husband or her son. Her enemies lost no opportunity to charge her with misconduct of all kinds. More than five hundred years after Margaret's death this examination of her life and career allows a more balanced and detached view.
Synopsis
Includes bibliographical references (p. [223]-232) and index.
Table of Contents
Arrival -- France -- Motherhood -- Business-as-usual -- Cade's Rebellion -- Context -- Debate -- Enmities -- Conditions and means -- Control and conciliation -- The road to war -- Words and deeds -- Revenge and reversals.