The Queen's Bed

December 2, 2013
Whitelock, director of the public history program at the University of London’s Royal Holloway College, follows up on her 2010 biography of Mary I, Mary Tudor, with a history of the reign of Mary’s younger sister and successor to the English throne, Elizabeth I. Maintaining the health and safety of the queen’s physical body was essential to maintaining peace within the realm, Whitelock argues, in a monograph that explores both the merging and diverging of Elizabeth’s private life and public persona. It was a process that was orchestrated, not just by Elizabeth herself, but also by the elite women who attended her in her private chambers. Elizabeth’s body represented the state itself to her subjects; thus her private life always was of public concern, from the questions concerning her virginity that arose before she acceded to the throne and continued unabated even after her death, to the unrelenting pressure upon her for decades to marry and bear children. This intimate portrait of Elizabeth’s private life, as refracted through her relationships with the ladies of her bedchamber, will engage any readers wishing for a more balanced portrait of Elizabeth the flawed human being, as opposed to simply another rehashing of the mythical representations of her as Gloriana.

December 1, 2013
Densely erudite, intriguing take on Queen Elizabeth I's very public private life. Although biographies of Elizabeth and her court are legion, this intimate portrait by Tudor scholar Whitelock (Mary Tudor: Princess, Bastard, Queen, 2011) delves into the nitty-gritty of the archives, diaries and records of people around the queen who physically knew her person. Indeed, the queen herself acknowledged upon accession to the throne in 1558 at age 25 that she had "two bodies": the natural body of a woman, flawed and corruptible, as well as the "body politic to govern," inviolable and enduring. Moreover, she was regarded as both feminine and masculine, as she famously alluded to in her Tilbury speech of 1588: "Although I have the body of a weak and feeble woman, I have the heart and stomach of a King, and a King of England too." Remaining unmarried plunged the queen's body "at the centre of a drama that encompassed the entirety of Europe." The metaphors in poetry or satire of the time, referring to the queen in chaste or erotic terms, reveal the charged, sexual anxiety around her accession and succession. Especially striking is the author's chronicle of Elizabeth's relationships over the course of her long reign; she was never alone, and she had several (probably consummated) love affairs or infatuations, most notably with her beloved Lord Robert Dudley. Her ladies-in-waiting certainly knew the skinny on Elizabeth, but they were fiercely loyal even after her death, when they refused to allow her body to be examined or disemboweled, thereby allowing her to remain regina intacta. Whitelock's deep reading into the primary sources of this period proves wonderfully satisfying. This chockablock, scholarly portrait invites further interest in this endlessly alluring queen.

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February 1, 2014

Whitelock (public history, Royal Holloway, Univ. of London; Mary Tudor: Princess, Bastard, Queen) follows her previous work on Mary I with a life of Elizabeth I in which she attempts to give the standard biographical details a fresh look by way of focusing on the "intimate" side of the queen's life: the world of her private chambers, her quasi-romantic relationships with her male favorites, and her friendships with and reliance on her female attendants. The last of these subjects is the most intriguing, but while one gets an anecdotal sense of the general court life of Elizabeth's ladies, they never quite emerge as full individuals. Somewhat stronger is Whitelock's exploration of the concept of the metaphorical link between Elizabeth's physical body and the political body of her country--while this is not a new idea, she presents a thorough look at the ways in which Elizabeth's beauty, health, and chastity (and rumors about each) were used by the queen, her supporters, and her enemies as signs of the state of the realm overall. VERDICT A serviceable biography, not groundbreaking but decidedly readable and with an interesting viewpoint. Those particularly interested in the women in Elizabeth's court might do well to read this in conjunction with Tracy Borman's Elizabeth's Women: Friends, Rivals, and Foes Who Shaped the Virgin Queen.--Kathleen McCallister, Univ. of South Carolina Libs., Columbia

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January 1, 2014
Whitelock delves deep into the court of Queen Elizabeth Iin fact, into the monarch's very bedchamber, where she examines the lives, the roles, and the influence of her most favored ladies-in-waiting. Culled from the aristocracy and much more than glorified servants, these women bathed, clothed, and often shared a bed with the queen. In doing so, they bore witness to the political rivalries, social gambits, and personal scandals that perpetually surrounded Elizabeth. Charged with pampering and protecting the queen's body, they also zealously guarded her secretsoften with very little thanks or considerationin the fishbowl environment of the Elizabethan court. This intimate history of Elizabeth's boudoir and the women who populated it approaches a popular biographical subject from an entirely fresh angle, providing an enlightening peek into her private persona.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2014, American Library Association.)