During the horrific, botched execution of James, Duke of Monmouth, in 1685, the crowd remained silent and ‘many cried’, until, incensed by the ‘barbarous usage’ of the duke, they surged forward and would have torn the executioner to pieces had soldiers not prevented it. Yet the label on Monmouth’s portrait in the National Gallery reads: […]
Reviews
Looking for your next read? HWA members review the best new historical writing, recommend their desert island books and revisit some old favourites.
Victoria: ITV’s New Flagship Drama
It is every teenager’s dream. At the age of 18 you break free of the Muggles who have been controlling your life since childhood and at the same time you are granted a miraculous power, which means that everybody has to do what you say. Even Harry Potter didn’t manage the last part but in […]
Accession by Livi Michael
Accession by Livi Michael is the third and final instalment of her Wars of the Roses trilogy which opens in 1444 with the novel Succession. The trilogy centres itself around Margaret Beaufort and Margaret of Anjou and their competing ambitions for their sons and the English throne. Novel three, as one would expect from this […]
1666: Plague, War and Hellfire by Rebecca Rideal
It is unsurprising that there seems to be a new appetite for the Stuart period, given the seventeenth century brought us some of the best and most enduring drama ever written, a regicide, a civil war, a republic, a restoration and, in the aftermath of all this, one of the most dramatically eventful and devastating […]
The Somme 1916 – From Both Sides of the Wire
About two thirds of the way through the first episode of The Somme 1916 – From Both Sides of the Wire (BBC2; six parts starting 18 July; prod/dir: Alastair Laurence) there is a sequence which could stand as a paradigm of what can be done with history on television. Peter Barton stands in the field […]
The Unseeing by Anna Mazzola
Every now and then a debut novel comes along that stands out from the crowd. The Unseeing by Anna Mazzola is one. Sarah Gale is a seamstress, prostitute and single mother, incarcerated in Newgate Prison, sentenced to hang for her role in the murder of Hannah Brown. Young, ambitious lawyer, Edmund Fleetwood, is appointed to […]
Upstart Crow: The New Blackadder?
Another one of those compelling BBC historical drama series has just finished. But don’t worry, a new series has already been commissioned along with a Christmas special. It may seem strange to mention Ben Elton’s latest comedy about William Shakespeare’s early career in the same genre as War and Peace and Wolf Hall. But historical […]
Desert Island Books: Matthew Harffy
When asked what five books I would take with me if I was stranded on a desert island, my first reaction was just to name my five favourite books, or at least the first five good books I could think of. But then I got thinking (often a bad idea, I find) about all the […]