Richard III
Brother, Protector, King
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- 3,99 €
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- 3,99 €
Publisher Description
'Fresh, gripping and vivid' Simon Sebag Montefiore
'Exhaustively researched and scrupulously even-handed' David Starkey
'A portrait that chills you to the bone' Leanda de Lisle, The Times
A dedicated brother and loyal stalwart to the Yorkist dynasty for most of his early life, Richard's personality was forged in the tribulation of exile and the brutality of combat. An ambitious nobleman and successful general with a loyal following, he could claim to have achieved every ambition in life except one: the crown.
By stripping back the legends that surround England's most controversial king and returning to original manuscript evidence, Chris Skidmore's compelling biography reveals Richard III as contemporaries saw him.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Skidmore (Bosworth: The Birth of the Tudors) successfully creates a balanced biography of the famously complicated last king of the Yorkist line. This well-researched chronological narrative searches for something close to the objective truth, navigating between the subsequent Tudor dynasty's once widely accepted disparagement of Richard as a deceitful, murderous man, and the smaller but fervently devoted Richard III Society's defense of him as pious and kind. Richard's sense of loyalty receives full attention; first to his brother and predecessor, Edward IV, and then to his supporters in the north of England. Notably, the recent finding and exhumation of Richard's body allows Skidmore to buttress his argument that, contrary to Shakespeare's version, the king spent his final hours fighting bravely, without hope of victory, against the forces of the man who took the throne from him, the future Henry VII. However, unlike some full-fledged Richard III apologists, Skidmore does not discount the possibility that Richard, during his reign, murdered his young nephews, Edward V and Prince Richard. While the label of "most controversial king" remains arguable, this carefully researched biography effectively captures Richard's turbulent reign and intense personality up to the violent end.
