In general, there was always one primary goal of a royal marriage: to beget an heir. And for a good part of the past millennium, when much of Western Europe was embroiled in perpetual warfare, it was believed that only a male heir would be able to defend and hold the throne, although a female could legally inherit the throne in England and Scotland. During more martial eras, royal wives who managed to produce only daughters-Katherine of Aragon and Anne Boleyn, for example-were disposed of by their spouse, powerless to challenge his authority. If execution was no longer an option to ending a problematic or infertile marriage, there was always divorce. Napoleon Bonaparte divorced his first wife, Josephine Beauharnais, because she failed to bear him a son.
With so many marriages being little more than dynastic alliances, how did these royals manage to survive their arranged nuptials and make their peace with the world into which they were born? Or did they? Precious few of the notorious royal marriages profiled in this book began as love matches—although they didn't necessarily stay that way. For several centuries, if things weren't working out, the monarch might play the all-purpose, get-out-of marriage-free card known as a papal dispensation on the grounds of consanguinity. In other words, plenty of unions were sundered after cousins who had received a dispensation to marry in the first place suddenly decided to become appalled and repulsed by how closely they were related when it became expedient to wed another.
With so many intriguing relationships, choosing whose stories to omit was nearly as difficult as selecting which ones to include. Within this volume are some of the world's most famous royal unions, as they affected and were affected by the historical and political events of the times; it is not intended to provide an overview of world history, to probe with great depth the wars and revolutions that gripped Europe for centuries, or to present a full biography of the principals.
Comparing the selection of a marriage partner to fishing for an eel—that staple of Renaissance diets-Sir Thomas More's father commented that it was as if "ye should put your hand into a blind bag full of snakes and eels together, seven snakes for one eel."
In these pages are the snakes as well as the eels—the disastrous unions and the delightful ones; the martyrs to marriage and the iconoclasts who barely took their vows seriously; the saintly and the suffering; the rebels, and the renegades-all of whom took the phrases "I do" and "I will" and ran as far as they could go with them, exploring and embracing the broad spectrum of passion, power, and possibilities far beyond the royal bedchamber.
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About Leslie Carroll
I used to tell people that I was born in Manhattan and raised in the Bronx; but the truth is that apart from the stellar education I received at the Fieldston School in Riverdale, much of who I am was shaped by my two grandmothers, who encouraged me to follow my bliss long before it became the sort of catchphrase you find on tee-shirts and new-age tchotchkes. My East Side grandmother took me to FAO Schwarz, the New York City Ballet, and afternoon tea at the Plaza Hotel, where I dreamed of becoming another Eloise. My West Side grandmother took me to the Central Park carousel and the zoo and treated me to colorful paper parasols and gummy, lukewarm pretzels from the vendors whose wares my East Side grandmother deemed too "dirty" for human consumption.
There are writers on both sides of my family, and although I always loved to write, I never anticipated that it would become my profession. I had wanted to be a ballerina; and though my club feet were corrected at birth (from the stilettos I adore now, you'd never know) and my short Achilles tendons made my toes turn in (corrected at the age of 9), I was never going to end up en pointe.
About a year later, I decided to become an actress when (if?) I grew up, and I never looked back. I majored in Theatre at Cornell University, worked in summer stock, and took classes with a couple of acknowledged masters. I performed a lot of Shakespeare and other classics in New York parks, basements, church choir lofts, and the occasional Off-Broadway theatre; then founded and ran my own nonprofit theatre company for several years. And when things got slow, and I found myself working three survival jobs simultaneously (one of them as a journalist and editor), I decided it was time to pursue an additional creative avenue.
Fast forward a decade. I'm now a multi-published author in three genres, as well as a freelance journalist. And I've also adapted a number of classic texts (Ivanhoe; The Prisoner of Zenda; The Scarlet Pimpernel; Mark Twain's The Diaries of Adam and Eve) for the stage. I began writing women's fiction and historical fiction simultaneously, but my first published novel was the urban romantic comedy Miss Match in 2002. In 2005, as I continued to write about feisty female New Yorkers, my first historical novel was published under the pen name Amanda Elyot. While keeping those literary plates spinning I made my historical nonfiction debut in the spring of 2008.
In what I laughingly refer to as my spare time, I'm still a professional actress, working when the scripts and the roles excite me.
I'm such a native New Yorker that I still don't have a driver's license, "Big Sky Country" means Central Park, and the farthest I've ever been from the Upper West Side for any great length of time was my four-year stint upstate in Ithaca, at Cornell, known for its rigorous academics and its equally harsh permafrost.
My birthday falls on the same day as two of my heroes—F. Scott Fitzgerald and Jim Henson. So I reread The Great Gatsby every year and number Miss Piggy among the great actresses of her generation. My favorite color is deep hydrangea blue, and it just kills me that it doesn't look good with red hair.
I live in Manhattan with my husband Scott—who is my hero and everything I ever dreamed of. For the past couple of years we've been considering an addition to the family in the form of a Cavalier King Charles Spaniel.
Also by Leslie Carroll...
For a list of all of Leslie's books, visit her site.
An Interview with Leslie Carroll
By Holly Hewson for The Romance StudioHH: Leslie, thank you for talking with us at TRS. Please tell us about your latest release, Notorious Royal Marriages. LC: Thank you for inviting me to share a bit about myself and my work with your readers!
HH: In this fascinating book, you take on royal marriages and provide an eye-opening wealth of information for the reader. How did the idea for this work come about? LC: Back in 2008, I made my nonfiction debut with ROYAL AFFAIRS: A Lusty Romp Through the Extramarital Adventures That Rocked the British Monarchy. ROYAL AFFAIRS profiles some of the world's most famous (or infamous) real-life love stories, spotlighting the mistresses and lovers involved in the adulterous royal relationships. Writing from the other side of the sheets, so to speak, about some of the world's most notorious royal marriages, felt like the logical next step. In NOTORIOUS ROYAL MARRIAGES, we get the queen's POV.
HH: How much research went into this story? LC: I had nine months to research, write, and deliver the manuscript and I worked right up to the very last tick of the second hand. My bibliography contains nearly 60 books and more than 20 biographical articles.
HH: What do you think fans of the romance genre will enjoy about your book? LC: It's a given that Romance readers adore a great love story; and many historical romances contain royal love stories, whether entirely or partially fictional. NOTORIOUS ROYAL MARRIAGES depicts "just the facts, ma'am"-the true stories behind some of the fictional interpretations, so it's fun to find out what really happened as well. And some of the royal marriages I profile were marvelous, passionate romances: Victoria and Albert, and Nicholas and Alexandra come to mind.
HH: Which royal marriage was your particular favorite to describe? LC: I had tremendous fun describing one of the seventeenth century's less well known marriages: that of George Ludwig of Hanover (the future King George I of England) and his wife Sophia Dorothea of Celle, a gorgeous hedonist who physically resembled Snow White. Sophia Dorothea was also George's first cousin; for several centuries there was a lot of first-cousin intermarriage in the royal houses of Europe-which could explain some of their nutty behavior. For humor, little beats their horrific marriage. For surprises, Victoria and Albert was great fun to write, because she was quite the little sex kitten as a young bride. And for pathos, the marriage of Marie Antoinette and the dauphin of France (the future Louis XVI) just grabbed my heart and hung on.
HH: What else do you have in store for lucky readers? LC: I'm working on my third nonfiction royal title: ROYAL PAINS: A Rogues' Gallery of Brats, Brutes, and Bad Seeds, due to be published in March 2011; and I'm also writing a historical fiction trilogy on the life of Marie Antoinette. I completely fell in love with her and Louis during my research for NOTORIOUS ROYAL MARRIAGES.
HH: What's a typical day like for you? LC: I'm up by 7:30 in the morning; grab a huge glass of strong, black, iced coffee, fire up the computer, and check my email. During the day I'll take out about 2 hours to hit the gym. I spend the rest of my day, into the evening, researching and/or writing, depending on what stage I'm at in a manuscript. My marvelously patient and supportive husband (my very own romance hero!) has gotten used to my doing research or edits on the living room couch in the evening. If I still have a lot of writing to do and I'm on a tight deadline, he'll keep me company in my home office, so we can maximize our "together time."
HH: What do you consider a really satisfying writing day? LC: Finishing a research book, and/or completing a chapter, or discovering the perfect atmospheric, or character, detail or nuance to layer in-what I call a "Eureka moment". At the end of the day I like to go to sleep with a sense of accomplishment.
HH: What do you personally enjoy reading? LC: Historical fiction. When I troll the historical fiction blogs, I'm like a kid in a candy store. I read about all these fabulous new releases and lament that my hectic writing schedule affords me little time to read purely for pleasure. Still, it's great to be busy!
HH: What would you most like to accomplish this year? LC: Completing my current manuscripts ahead of schedule so I can get a jump on researching and writing the ones "on deck." I'd also like to spend more time connecting directly with readers. I'm a people person and writing is a solitary profession. I LOVE chatting with readers about books, life, and their favorite royals, whether it's on blogs or meeting with book clubs.
HH: Thank you!
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