Elizabeth Woodville: Mother of the Princes in the Tower

Book Description

A historical character whose life no novelist would ever have dared to write. A woman whose contemporaries portrayed her as a sorceress demands the attention of all who are interested in medieval and royal history

Customer Reviews:

Mothers In and Out of Power.......2007-09-05

Elizabeth Woodville was of good stock (despite the slander put about by her detractors). She was descended from Charlemagne on her mother's side; her father was a knight. She was married very young to the eldest son (John Grey) of another knight (who, like her father, had married up), and bore two sons before her husband was killed fighting on the Lancastrian side in the Wars of the Roses. When the new Yorkist King Edward IV traveled through the region consolidating new alliances with these old enemies, he saw the beautiful young widow and, legend has it, fell for her then and there. But perhaps his "falling in love" was hardly the romantic chance encounter it was made out to be afterwards. Edward's choice shook loose Warwick's and probably his mother's efforts to set his agenda. Elizabeth bore him ten children, including two sons who were murdered in the Tower after Edward died. Meanwhile the Yorkist nobility, abetted later by the Lancastrian Tudors, slandered Elizabeth and her family in terms republished even in this century. The story was an eye-opener about the power of slander in shaping enduring public opinion. Five hundred years later, I have a book in front of me published in 2002, by a respectable historian, which characterizes the king's marriage to Elizabeth as "ill-fated," and the Woodvilles as a "horde" of impoverished, grasping nobodies with nothing to offer. Apparently Edward IV did not share that opinion.

When Edward IV died, Elizabeth's luck ran out. Richard III seized power and clapped her boys in the Tower, and by autumn of 1483 she knew she would never be the mother of a king. But she didn't have ten royal pregnancies for nothing. After she knew her boys must be dead, she thought it would be a good idea if Richard married her daughter Elizabeth of York (a plan Richard was later obliged to repudiate). You have to be impressed by this woman in her situation who could still keep her eye on the ball. If she couldn't be the mother of a king, then she would be the mother of a queen. She did get her daughter Elizabeth of York on the throne, finally, as wife of Henry VII. It was actually Henry's mother Margaret Beaufort who sought the alliance, which Elizabeth must have thought was appropriate.

It may have been partly the old contempt for the Beauforts' illegitimacy (Baldwin could have done a much better job explaining who this Henry Tudor was); but Elizabeth probably believed that it was her daughter's royal blood that legitimatized Henry's claim to the throne. The honor was all on his side.

Henry did not act very honored. On the contrary, it seemed he had married one of Edward IV's daughters for no other purpose than to eclipse them. A year and a-half after Bosworth and the birth of their first son, Henry hadn't agreed to his wife's coronation yet. He would not have it said he ruled by right of his wife. And he neither needed nor listened to anybody's counsel but his mother's. So much for being the power behind the throne. Elizabeth was completely outclassed.

In early 1487 Elizabeth took some part, it is not known exactly what it was, in the serious Simnel conspiracy leading to what Baldwin calls the Last Battle of the Wars of the Roses. Her object, Baldwin thinks, was to get rid of the king and his mother, then marry her daughter to her Yorkist cousin Warwick. Then she would be the power behind the throne for sure. She must have been clumsy or she trusted someone she shouldn't have, because Henry learned her part in it. What a disaster for her in this, her last throw of the dice as Baldwin calls it. Henry stripped Elizabeth of all her lands and income, and confined her to an abbey for the remainder of her life where she could cause no more mischief. Her role in the conspiracy, and the roles of other people Henry may have trusted, were covered up because it would not have helped the stability of his reign right then. The former Queen of England, once so powerful and beloved, died in poverty during the reign of a man and his mother who must have loathed her. She was buried without ceremony. Nobody important came to the requiem mass.

She tried!

It just goes to show: Medieval noblewomen liked power as much as men did. A wife of the king might influence him (but not if her mother-in-law was still around; witness Elizabeth of York), but she really came into her own as the widowed mother of a king. That is, of course, if the child listened to her. According to Michael Jones in Bosworth 1485, Edward IV's mother Cecily was so enraged when her son thumbed his nose at her by marrying Elizabeth instead of the French king's sister-in-law, she usurped the queen's apartments and attempted to have him overthrown in favor of his younger brother Clarence by claiming he was illegitimate! This was clearly a mother angry that she didn't have more influence. (Odd that Baldwin does not mention this; perhaps he regarded it as gossip meant to denigrate Elizabeth.) Skeptics argue that Elizabeth was unlikely to do anything to injure her own daughter and grandson, but look. Medieval parents regarded children as personal assets. They created them; they expected to use them. (Wait a minute. I know a mother just like that today.) Elizabeth had other young unmarried daughters with royal blood, too, don't forget. Like Cecily, she might have thought of herself as a sort of kingmaker. She didn't like the present situation. She was frustrated. She thought she could do better. The example of Cecily's willingness to skewer one disobedient son because she had others in stock suggests something about human nature that transcends the cultural ideal. Or perhaps power corrupts. Maybe mothers like Margaret of Anjou and Margaret Beaufort were selflessly committed to one royal child because one was all they had--there was no other avenue to power for them. Yes, I can believe that of Elizabeth. And there's no reason to disapprove of her any more than we should presume to disapprove of Henry and his mother, who used her.

My main complaint about the book is the writing style. A reviewer here said the book was readable but not compelling. Funny, I thought it was the other way around. Or rather, it was intrinsically compelling despite the writing. Baldwin seems allergic to the short, declarative sentence. Paragraphs are often too long. Key points may be buried two or three thousand words deep. Consider this mess of a sentence: "It was the more ascetic, gentler monarchs, like Henry III, Richard II, and Henry VI, who either lost their thrones or came close to losing them, and it can be argued, quite reasonably, that if Richard III had not possessed a comparable streak of determination in his character he would not have found government easy even if he had won the Battle of Bosworth." Huh?

Fascinating times, a real and very human woman. Wish it were a better read.

An fascinating lady.......2007-06-17

A complex book about a complex woman in complex times. I knew little about Elizabeth Woodville until I discovered this book but after digesting the detailed material within, you are completely briefed on the person, the extended family, the politics and the times. The tragedy of her children, the ruthlessness of power around her etc, can only mean you conclude the book with great sympathy for Woodville. I commend this book despite the rather dull prose (at times)

Great Biography.......2007-02-21

I've always been looking for a book on Elizabeth Woodville. History hasn't been too kind to her yet she was the mother of the princes in the tower. She went from being a widow with two children among the English class to being Queen of England. Its so rare for that to happen. You can understand the secrecy surrounding the marriage in the beginning because the other nobles weren't thrilled to say the least and most likely tried to find ways to keep the marriage from happening unfortunately that would later be used to declare her marriage invalid. How horrible it must have been to lose her husband, have her marriage invalid and lose her two sons. At least she got to live long enough to see her daughter become queen.

A fun biography of an interesting woman.......2004-01-02

My primary interest in history--or at least that period in which I did my MA--has always been in the ancient near east. Over the past four or five years, however, I have been branching out more. Of late in particular I have been filling in what I learned of English history in a survey course I took years ago. I've read some on Richard III, on Edward I, II, III, and IV and on Edward the Black Prince. I've followed up on King Harold and his "difference of opinion" with William of Normandy, etc.

In reading some of these works, I find that I've learned only tangentially anything about the women of these episodes. When I came upon a reference to David Baldwin's book on Elizabeth Woodville Mother of the Princes in the Tower, my curiosity was immediately aroused, and I decided to find out something more about one of these women in the background, to see what part they actually played in the drama of their times.

Like most people interested in English history, I know the Shakespeare Richard III and the story of the little princes in the tower. Having read some of the history of the period, I realized too that the queen was not well liked by many of the more influential and established nobility of her husband's realm. These individuals tended to depict her as a small town upstart who capitalized on her personal beauty to better all of the members of her family at the expense of the "legitimate" nobility. This set the stage for a very shaky government; one tested more than once by the disaffected, and created the drama of the Tower and of Richard III. Baldwin gets at the character of Elizabeth by looking at the extant documents of the time and by analyzing how the woman fit into the on going politics of her husband's reign rather than by following the contemporary accounts circulated by the woman's detractors.

I was particularly fascinated by the degree to which each phase of English history links naturally with its predecessor and its successor--not that this is particularly surprising perhaps. Some of the histories of other countries have far more discrete hiatuses between phases. This flow is particularly noticeable when it is viewed from the perspective of Elizabeth Woodville and her family. The royal genetics of the period was definitely convoluted. It was amazing how interrelated were not only the branches of the royal family with one another but with some of the nobility as well. (Looking at other genealogies reveals the degree to which the nobility of most of Europe were interrelated.) That "six degrees of separation" thing was definitely in operation here and pushed to the limit. It left the possibility of Elizabeth's either mending the rift between the houses of Lancaster and York, which is what the author theorizes was the intention of Edward IV, or exacerbating it. It also left a lot of people with a potential claim on the throne and with incentive to cause trouble--which is how the rift began in the first place. The chain continues into the future through the connection of the Tudors with the ultimate patriarch, Edward III. Elizabeth, her daughter--mother of Henry VIII--and her two sons help complete that link. Fascinating.

FOR THOSE WRITING PAPERS IN HISTORY, HISTRIOGRAPHY, SOCIOLOGY, POLITICAL SCIENCES, WOMENS' STUDIES: One might look at how documents like accounts can be used to clarify lifestyles (clothing, expenses for servants, etc), status, power structures, etc or to write a biography such as this one. One might write a paper on the use of power by women in history, on how women acquire power within a society or at what the study of women and other "background" figures reveal about events during a particular episode in time. One might compare less favorable studies of Elizabeth Woodville with this one to determine to what extent the author's assessment of her reign is accurate. One might look at the story of the princes in the tower as it is told in Shakespeare--or Josephine Tey's novel Daughter of Time--and as it is presented in Baldwin's biography of Elizabeth to determine who might actually have committed the murders.

A fun biography of an interesting woman

Worth reading, but not compelling.......2003-12-10

Readers with an interest in the Wars of the Roses will find this book about Elizabeth Woodville, Edward IV's Queen, and the mother of the "Princes in the Tower", perfectly readable, but not extremely compelling. This may be due to the relative scarcity of reliable, original source information about her. (I think much of the contemporary information about her is speculation about how she, a widow from the gentry class with two children, managed to attract and win the King, suggesting that witchcraft was involved.) My sense is the book may go a little far in "white-washing" her historical reputation as grasping, selfish, proud and haughty. I just don't think the sketchy information the author was able to marshall was convincing enough to really establish what kind of person Elizabeth actually was, one way or other.

Also, regarding the earlier reviewer's suggestion that Elizabeth's negative reputation owes to the Tudors "looking back in anger", it might pay to remember that Henry VIII's grandmother was, in fact, Elizabeth Woodville (his mother's mother), so I'm not certain how much her historical reputation is a result of this. I think it actually owes a lot more to her contemporary Yorkist rivals, who were threatened by her very unexpected emergence onto the scene and potential power she could wield as the King's wife, than to the later Tudors, a dynasty Elizabeth's own daughter founded when she married Henry Tudor.

Customer Reviews:

Loaded with detail - what a career!.......2001-10-20

I've read lots of books about the personalities involved in British motorsport and the British car industry in general. This was the best. Heavy on detail regarding BRM from the V16 F1 car of the early fifties to the rear engined cars of the mid to late sixties. It has several excellent chapters on Rudd's time at Lotus after this and is the best description of the Lotus companies from the early seventies into the eighties I've seen. Heavy in engineering detail, light on the biographical aspects. Good info on everything from the Lotus powerboat efforts to engineering's involvement with the Chevy Corvette. Very dense with facts - not an easy read but well worth the effort.

Book Description

American Jews have a powerful cultural narrative that seemingly speaks on their behalf. According to this narrative, Eastern European Jewish immigrants built the film industry in the first decade of this century and dominated it by the second. As opposed to determining a particularly Jewish vision of America, Steven Alan Carr argues that this way of looking at Jews in Hollywood emanates from a particularly American vision of Jews. Like the Jewish Question of the 19th century--which fretted over the full participation of Jews within public life--the Hollywood Question of the 1920s, 30s and 40s fretted over Jewish participation within the mass media. As a whole way of thinking and talking about both Jews and motion pictures, Hollywood and Anti-Semitism reveals a powerful set of assumptions concerning ethnicity, intent and media influence. Steven Alan Carr is an Assistant Professor of Communication at Indiana University-Purdue University, Fort Wayne. His work appears in Cinema Journal and other publications. This is his first book.

Customer Reviews:

A look at anti-semitism.......2001-07-23

This is a well-researched work that deals with Hollywood and issues of Jewish control - and how those issues have influenced politics and popular culture. The writing is nothing spectacular - a tone that was a bit livelier would certainly not have hurt the book's academic credibility - but Carr compensates by offering a mountain of research. It's amazing to see what kinds of offensive things that members of the government and famous citizens (Henry Ford, Charles Lindbergh) got away with saying only 60-70 years ago. All in all, this is a useful book on an important subject.

Hollywood and Anti-Semitism: A Cultural History Up to World War II. (Book Reviews).(Book Review): An article from: Cineaste

Average customer rating:

Hollywood and Anti-Semitism: A Cultural History Up to World War II. (Book Reviews).(Book Review): An article from: Cineaste
Art Simon
Manufacturer: Cineaste Publishers, Inc.
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Digital

General | Performing Arts | Arts & Photography | Subjects | Books
ASIN: B0008FLN12
Release Date: 2005-07-30

Book Description

This digital document is an article from Cineaste, published by Cineaste Publishers, Inc. on September 22, 2002. The length of the article is 1339 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Citation Details
Title: Hollywood and Anti-Semitism: A Cultural History Up to World War II. (Book Reviews).(Book Review)
Author: Art Simon
Publication: Cineaste (Magazine/Journal)
Date: September 22, 2002
Publisher: Cineaste Publishers, Inc.
Volume: 27 Issue: 4 Page: 59(3)

Article Type: Book Review

Distributed by Thomson Gale

Hollywood and Anti-Semitism: a Cultural History up to World War II.(Book Review): An article from: American Jewish History

Average customer rating:

Hollywood and Anti-Semitism: a Cultural History up to World War II.(Book Review): An article from: American Jewish History
Sharon Pucker Rivo
Manufacturer: American Jewish Historical Society
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Digital
ASIN: B00082DH1O
Release Date: 2005-07-31

Book Description

This digital document is an article from American Jewish History, published by American Jewish Historical Society on December 1, 2002. The length of the article is 841 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Citation Details
Title: Hollywood and Anti-Semitism: a Cultural History up to World War II.(Book Review)
Author: Sharon Pucker Rivo
Publication: American Jewish History (Refereed)
Date: December 1, 2002
Publisher: American Jewish Historical Society
Volume: 90 Issue: 4 Page: 456(3)

Article Type: Book Review

Distributed by Thomson Gale

Book Description

A collection of Diane Warren's most recent hit songs. Titles include: Because You Loved Me * Can't Get You Out of My Heart * Un-Break My Heart * I'd Lie for You (And That's the Truth) * For You I Will * Feels Like Home * Show Me the Way Back to Your Heart.

Customer Reviews:

Mediocre Setting Information.......2003-07-15

While it is true that this is a better reference for Sabbat characters than Camarilla, this is not because of wanton sexuality or anything like that. It is a book about discovering yourself through all outlets: pain, thought, suffering, sexuality, sensuality, etc. This is more of a Sabbat outlook than a Camarilla one, so it is more appropriate for those characters.

That set aside, it is not really all that helpful a resource. Some of the book was obviously researched, I can tell that from my own studies. However, much of it was merely Lilith bemoaning her fate. Dark Mother indeed. Where is this Mother's self-sufficiency, her self-confidence, her satisfaction at what she is done? Nowhere. It is a book about her whining and using her powers to seduce those she hates until she meets her love, Lucifer.

While that is all very interesting, the art is neither detailed nor differentiated. The only really interesting pictures are toward the end, where Lilith is dressed in the outfits of Pharoh, and where she holds Lucifer's sword and prepares to slaughter her enemies. The text is not as poetic as you would be likely to think, if you had read The Book of Nod or The Erciyes Fragments, both of which are wonderful and highly recommended. If you have need of more of that, go ahead and pick this up. If you have players who are Lilins, go ahead and have them pick this up. If you are interested in vampire flavor, this is not really for you. It shuns vampires mainly, and it is not really useful for them.
Harkius

The little details add so much!.......2002-09-14

As I force my players to dive deeper into the mysterious world of Kindred and fight against destruction, prophecy can be a wonderful thing. I use this book, along with "The Book of Nod" and other WoD books to develop unique interpretations to the story we have just finished our fourth summer of playing. Told from the point of view of someone investigating the cults concerning Lilith, we get 3 "books" about the Dark Mother. These three agree on many points but it is the contradictions that I find most useful in the game. A creepy feeling surrounds the book and you may get chills just from reading it.

Not very good..........2001-07-06

This book is beautifully illustrated with a frequent subject being lilith's naked form which is a theme of the book really. Sleeping with Adam, Eve, Caine, Lucifer, God (yes, God), Animals, and probably a dozen or so more folk that I've forgotten. The Book is best for a Sabbat book because it's appeal to such base sexual things instead of any divine mystery or questioning doesn't provide much. The narrator is also far less interesting than Aristole DeLaurent and Beckett.

Best book in the WoD theme.......2001-02-06

I loved this book! The words--the visualizations they produce--it's pure poetry, something not usually seen in a source book for a roleplaying world. I could put myself in Lilith's shoes, and understand her pain, her joy. I mined this book for information, and got a teasure. If you deal with Lilith in your game, this is the perfect book for you.

The best reference to the dark mother on vampire........1999-03-01

It is a great book in a Book of Nod fashion, deatiling all the references to the dark mother Lilith, I really loved this book, beatifully illustrated, and magnificently writed. It is one of the best sources for every vampire in the misterious world of darkness in Vampire: The mascarade.

Average customer rating:

Market Insights without hesitation

This Book is The White Truffle of Finance

One good concept and a lot of BLA BLA

This book is overpriced.

A Useful Investment Tool

Behavioral Trading: Methods for Measuring Investor Confidence and Expectations and Market Trends
Woody Dorsey
Manufacturer: Texere
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
Similar Items:

Evidence-Based Technical Analysis: Applying the Scientific Method and Statistical Inference to Trading Signals

Way of the Turtle: The Secret Methods that Turned Ordinary People into Legendary Traders

The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable

Inside the House of Money: Top Hedge Fund Traders on Profiting in the Global Markets

The (Mis) Behavior of Markets: A Fractal View of Risk, Ruin And Reward

ASIN: 1587991640

Book Description

Have you ever wondered to what extent investor confidence and expectations impact stock market prices? In Behavioral Trading, stock market contrarian, Woody Dorsey, gives readers for the first time insight into his highly profitable proprietary market diagnosis techniques. These are often described as market expectations theory, behavioral finance and most commonly contrary opinion analysis. Dorsey's work is followed by major investors and the financial media seeks his macroeconomic perspective that is more than six months ahead of the crowd. For the first time, Woody Dorsey shows how his technique makes behavioral economics practical, accessible and understandable. He has developed his unique insights from his research of financial market probabilities during the past twenty years. Market Semiotics, both the name of Dorsey's company and his technique, is a research philosophy based on the logic of behavioral finance. In an illuminating and amusing fashion, this book offers an original and disciplined perspective that delivers precise forecasts of the market.

Customer Reviews:

Market Insights without hesitation.......2007-06-02

I've been following Dorsey's ongoing work since 2003 when this book was released. It is essential to traders and investors alike, in order to capture the profits available from Market events. Also Dorsey avoids the risks inherent in events when faced with a beligerent Market. Dorsey's Book is the best work on Market Phenomenology since Reminiscences of a Stock Operator.

11/10

This Book is The White Truffle of Finance.......2006-09-03

Subtle, yet powerful flavors. Not for everyone. You really have to take the time to read it. I found myself coming back to it because it contains the principles behind successful investing. It's a groundbreaking work that may not be recognized for some time. It has rare or medium-rare, as you like it, insights into the market. Why read all the ordinary market books which all say the same thing. This is new ground.

One good concept and a lot of BLA BLA.......2005-10-02

Reader be advised that the author owns a consulting firm that applies Woody's proprietary model in making market forecasts and, needless to say, he's not giving out anything ...
Interestingly enough, the author criticizes the use of quantitative models, but later attempts to measure the "mood" of the market to use it in a quantitative model ... ? One more comment: the average reader of business publications expects to find some logic in the style; this is not fiction, and using a "keep the reader guessing what the author REALLY means" is no business reading.
Did you take English 101 like the rest of us?

This book is overpriced........2004-07-30

This book is a tool for the author to market his service. I cannot get much insight nor technique out of this book. John Mauldin's Bull's Eye Investing is selling for $17 and it's packed with all the information you need about investing. For trading, I would turn to the all time classic: Reminiscences of a Stock Operator. Human behavior hasn't changed much in the past century.

A Useful Investment Tool.......2004-06-13

This book gives you an inside view of one company's philosophy on using market psychology to make money in the market. Dorsey examines various approaches people use toward this end, before describing his own.

He begins by showing us how the market is not rational. Never has been, never will be. I personally experienced this during the dotcom stock bubble. I had shares of stocks that, per rational theory, should have done remarkably well. I did not own shares of Yahoo--which, per rational theory, was a total dog. My stocks stayed flat, while Yahoo soared. So much for rational theory. If you get nothing else from this book, the explanation of that lesson alone makes it worth reading.

Next, Dorsey delves into the three general concepts of psychological trading. All of these seem good on the surface, but results are inconsistent. Maritimers long ago learned how to navigate by triangulation. Dorsey navigates the stock market the same way, with his "triunity" approach. He shows how looking at the intersections of the three general concepts produces consistent results.

You may have read books espousing some "can't miss" philosophy or another. Don't worry--Dorsey lets the reader know his triunity approach still requires judgment. For example, if the indicators are in a certain area, that would be an indication that the market is about to hit a peak.

Dorsey explains that his method might miss the peak. And, it might miss a trough. But if you are not greedy, his method would appear to be a useful tool for profitable investing. Remember, pigs eat well but hogs get slaughtered.

Books:

Books Index

Books Home

Recommended Books