Overview

A new appraisal of the first Tudor queen, her European connections, her ambitions and intentions, and the religious violence that stained her short reign The lifestory of Mary I—daughter of Henry VIII and his Spanish wife, Catherine of Aragon—is often distilled to a few dramatic episodes: her victory over the attempted coup by Lady Jane Grey, the imprisonment of her half-sister Elizabeth, the bloody burning of Protestants, her short marriage to Philip of Spain. This original and deeply researched biography paints a far more detailed portrait of Mary and offers a fresh understanding of her religious faith and policies as well as her historical significance in England and beyond. John Edwards, a leading scholar of English and Spanish history, is the first to make full use of Continental archives in this context, especially Spanish ones, to demonstrate how Mary's culture, Catholic faith, and politics were thoroughly Spanish. Edwards begins with Mary's origins, follows her as she battles her increasingly erratic father, and focuses particular attention on her notorious religious policies, some of which went horribly wrong from her point of view. The book concludes with a consideration of Mary's five-year reign and the frustrations that plagued her final years. Childless, ill, deserted by her husband, Mary died in the full knowledge that her Protestant half-sister Elizabeth would undo her religious work and, without acknowledging her sister, would reap the benefits of Mary's achievements in government.

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9780300194166

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Reviews

"""[T]he most comprehensive and convincing account to date.""—J.H. Elliott, The New York Review of Books -- J.H. Elliott * The New York Review of Books * “Edwards has comprehensively defeated a persistent and painful historical myth and replaced it with something more complicated, more human and much more accurate. This is the best biography of Mary we have yet seen.”—Lucy Wooding, Times Higher Education -- Lucy Wooding * Times Higher Education *"

'Mary has not lacked for biographers, but John Edwards has managed to outclass them all. For the first time we have a proper account of her with a fully European-wide perspective, depicting a Trastamara princess as well as a Tudor, and using a framework of Spanish documentation which English historians have seldom consulted. This is a biography without undue indulgence but replete with human sympathy.' (Diarmaid MacCulloch) 'Edwards has comprehensively defeated a persistent and painful historical myth and replaced it with something more complicated, more human and much more accurate. This is the best biography of Mary we have yet seen.' (Lucy Wooding, Times Higher Education) 'The most comprehensive and convincing account to date.' (J.H. Elliott, The New York Review of Books)

Author Information

John Edwards is Modern Languages Faculty Research Fellow in Spanish, University of Oxford. He lives in Oxford, UK.

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