The romance of Queen Elizabeth I and Robert Devereux captures “the real drama of ambition, passion, and personality in the pageant of veracious history” (The Philadelphia Inquirer). The author who helped to shape the modern biography turned his glorious prose and searing wit to one of the most famous romances in British history, that of Queen Elizabeth I and Robert Devereux, Earl of Essex. As the San Francisco Chronicle raved, “Elizabeth is an old subject, but here is a fresh and brilliant portrait of her, a splendidly dramatic story, an historical excursion of uncommon interest.” In these pages, Lytton Strachey follows the twists and turns of the uncommon affair. The stepson of the Earl of Leicester, the Queen’s favorite, Robert was not yet twenty when he captured the fifty-three-year-old monarch’s interest. Their tumultuous relationship survived international intrigue, political machinations, and even the young Earl’s marriage. But it was only a matter of time before his ambition would clash with the capricious Queen, bringing about his untimely end. This biography “is penetrating and true. It is not only Mr. Strachey’s best book; it is a great book” (New-York Evening Post). “A beautiful and memorable book.” —The Atlantic Monthly “If there is such a thing as imperishable prose being written in our time, Mr. Strachey has done it here.” —The New York Times Book Review “Mr. Strachey unfolds this story in brilliant chapter after brilliant chapter, unraveling the tangled threads of amorous intrigue and political machination . . . Above all, he writes as beautifully as he thinks.” —Outlook “It is a glowing history in words.” —Boston Evening Transcript

This biography of Queen Elizabeth I of England focuses on the queen's relationship with Robert Devereux, Earl of Essex. The author attempts to provide a psychoanalytical analysis of Queen Elizabeth by examining this relationship.

'The experience of insecurity, it turned out, would shape one of the most remarkable monarchs in England's history' In the popular imagination, as in her portraits, Elizabeth I is the image of monarchical power. But this image is as much armour as a reflection of the truth. In this illuminating account of England's iconic queen, Helen Castor reveals her reign as shaped by a profound and enduring insecurity that was a matter of both practical politics and personal psychology.

Despite widespread interest in Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex, little has been written about him in decades past. In Elizabeth I's Last Favourite, Sarah-Beth Watkins brings the story of his life, and death, back into the public eye. In the later years of Elizabeth I's reign, Robert Devereux became the ageing queen's last favourite. The young upstart courtier was the stepson of her most famous love, Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester. Although he tried, throughout his life, to live up to his stepfather's memory, Essex would never be the man he was. His love for the queen ran in tandem with undercurrents of selfishness and greed. Yet, Elizabeth showered him with affection, gifts and the tolerance only a mother could have for an errant son. In return, for a time, Essex flattered her and pandered to her every whim. But, one disastrous commission after another befell the earl, from his military campaigns, to voyages seeking treasure, to his stint as spymaster. Ultimately, his relationship with the queen would suffer and his final act of rebellion would force Elizabeth I to ensure her last favourite troubled her no more.

Elizabeth Hardwick was one of America’s great postwar women of letters, celebrated as a novelist and as an essayist. Until now, however, her slim but remarkable achievement as a writer of short stories has remained largely hidden, with her work tucked away in the pages of the periodicals—such asPartisan Review, The New Yorker, and The New York Review of Books—in which it originally appeared. This first collection of Hardwick’s short fiction reveals her brilliance as a stylist and as an observer of contemporary life. A young woman returns from New York to her childhood Kentucky home and discovers the world of difference within her. A girl’s boyfriend is not quite good enough, his “silvery eyes, light and cool, revealing nothing except pure possibility, like a coin in hand.” A magazine editor’s life falls strangely to pieces after she loses both her husband and her job. Individual lives and the life of New York, the setting or backdrop for most of these stories, are strikingly and memorably depicted in Hardwick’s beautiful and razor-sharp prose.

One of today's premier historical novelists, "New York Times" bestseller George dazzles here as she tackles her most difficult subject yet: the legendary Elizabeth Tudor, queen of enigma. But what was she really like? In this novel, her flame-haired, lookalike cousin, Lettice Knollys, thinks she knows all too well.

Elizabeth I is one of England's most admired and celebrated rulers. She is also one of its most iconic: her image is familiar from paintings, film and television. This wide-ranging interdisciplinary collection of essays examines the origins and development of the image and myths that came to surround the Virgin Queen. The essays question the prevailing assumptions about the mythic Elizabeth and challenge the view that she was unambiguously celebrated in the literature and portraiture of the early modern era. They explain how the most familiar myths surrounding the queen developed from the concerns of her contemporaries and yet continue to reverberate today. Published to mark the 400th anniversary of the queen's death, this volume will appeal to all those with an interest in the historiography of Elizabeth's reign and Elizabethan, and Jacobean, poets, dramatists and artists.