Download or read book The Life of Edward Seymour written by Margaret Scard and published by The History Press. This book was released on 2016-10-06 with total page 382 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In January 1547 Henry VIII lay dying. His heir was just 9 years old and all England waited expectantly to see who would hold the reins of power until Edward VI came of age. Within days of Henry's death, the privy council overturned the terms of his will and Edward Seymour, Duke of Somerset was named Lord Protector. It was a decision that the men in power would come to regret. For nearly three years, Somerset was 'king in all but name', the most powerful man in England. But though he was a skilled soldier and leader on the battlefield, Somerset's political skills were not so well-honed. His single-mindedness and his overbearing attitude towards the privy Councillors alienated the very men whose support he most needed. When they lost patience with him, the scene was set for conflict. Despite energetic opposition, his religious reform was his greatest success and the establishment of the Book of Common Prayer, which laid the foundation of the Anglican Church, was to be his most enduring achievement. However, his efforts to lessen the authoritarian rule imposed by Henry VIII and to improve the well-being of the common folk led to widespread rebellion, and as his attempt to subdue the Scots failed, England faced war with France. To the people Edward Seymour was the 'Good Duke'. To his fellow Councillors he was a traitor. This is a story of Tudor ambition, power and the ultimate price of failure.

Download or read book On This Day in Tudor History written by Claire Ridgway and published by Madeglobal Publishing. This book was released on 2015-09-23 with total page 650 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "On This Day in Tudor History" gives a day-by-day look at events from the Tudor era, including births, deaths, baptisms, marriages, battles, arrests, executions and more. This must-have book for Tudor history lovers is perfect for: - Dipping into daily over your morning coffee - Using in the classroom - Trivia nights and quizzes - Finding out what happened on your birthday or special day - Wowing friends and family with your Tudor history knowledge - Researching the Tudor period Written by best-selling Tudor history author Claire Ridgway, "On This Day in Tudor History" contains a wealth of information about your favourite Tudor monarchs, their subjects and the times they lived in. Did you know: on 17th January 1569 Agnes Bowker gave birth to a cat?

Download or read book The Boy King written by Janet Wertman and published by Janet Wertman. This book was released on 2020-09-30 with total page 392 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: One of Open Letters Review's Ten Best Historical Novels of 2020; First Place Winner, 2021 Chaucer Award for pre-1750s historical fiction "Highly recommend both as a standalone and series read. Wertman's work is among the best Tudor fiction on the market" - Historical Fiction Reader His mother, Jane Seymour, died at his birth; now his father, King Henry VIII, has died as well. Nine-year-old Edward Tudor ascends to the throne of England and quickly learns that he cannot trust anyone, even himself. Struggling to understand the political and religious turmoil that threatens the realm, Edward is at first relieved that his uncle, the new Duke of Somerset, will act on his behalf as Lord Protector, but this consolation evaporates as jealousy spreads through the court. Challengers arise on all sides to wrest control of the child king, and through him, England. While Edward can bring frustratingly little direction to the Council's policies, he refuses to abandon his one firm conviction: that Catholicism has no place in England. When Edward falls ill, this steadfast belief threatens England's best hope for a smooth succession: the transfer of the throne to Edward's very Catholic half-sister, Mary Tudor, whose heart's desire is to return the realm to the way it worshipped in her mother's day.

Download or read book The Trembling of a Leaf written by William Somerset Maugham and published by Mondial. This book was released on 2008 with total page 154 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In 1916, William Somerset Maugham (1874-1965) travelled to the Pacific to research his novel "The Moon and Sixpence," based on the life of Paul Gauguin. This was the first of those journeys through the late-Imperial world of the 1920s and 1930s which were to establish Maugham forever in the popular imagination as the chronicler of the last days of colonialism in India, Southeast Asia, China and the Pacific, although the books on which this reputation rests represent only a fraction of his output.---Maugham reused elements of his Pacific diaries in "The Trembling of a Leaf" (1921), which contains one of his most recognized stories, "Rain," adapted to the stage by John Colton and Clemence Randolph in 1922.

Download or read book Xenomorphs written by Russ Morrissey and published by Lulu.com. This book was released on 2017-11-07 with total page 62 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Dare to enter a gritty setting of sci-fi survival horror! In these pages you will find a survival horror setting for your science-fiction WOIN games detailing known space, careers, equipment, monsters, and more; plus a detailed terraforming colony on a small, weatherbeaten moon some 40 light years from earth, and a terrifying adventure which charts the events just prior to the colony's loss of contact with the Chen Zua Corporation, the company behind the terraforming technology that oversees the United Planets Terraforming Contracts. Terror and monsters await in the depth of space! So welcome to Somerset Landing and hold on tight... as all hell is about to break loose! Requires the use of a What's OLD is NEW core rulebook.

Download or read book The Plantagenets The Kings That Made Britain written by Derek Wilson and published by Quercus. This book was released on 2014-12-09 with total page 234 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Plantagenet is the name given to the English royal house descended from the union of Queen Matilda of England and her second husband Geoffrey of Anjou. The name derived from Geoffrey's nickname, which came from the sprig of broom (planta genet) which he wore in his hat. The Plantagenets ruled England for more than three hundred years, from the accession of reign of the dynasty's founder, Matilda and Geoffrey's son, Henry II, in 1154, to the death of the last Plantagenet, Richard III, at the Battle of Bosworth in 1485. The Plantagenets: The Kings That Made Britain is a compelling, year-by-year chronology of a tumultuous and critical period in the development of the English nation. Each year is covered by a concise, informative and accessible narrative, amplified by extensive quotation from contemporary sources and accompanied by generously captioned and stunning images of the period-including illuminations, portraits, maps, royal seals, tapestries and other artifacts. Authoritative, informative and sumptuous, and compiled by a scholar who is steeped in knowledge of the period, The Plantagenets: The Kings That Made Britain brings a critical era of English history dramatically and vividly to life. It is the perfect gift book for anyone with a love of, or fascination for, medieval English history.

Download or read book Queen Anne written by Anne Somerset and published by Vintage. This book was released on 2013-10-15 with total page 871 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: She ascended the thrones of England, Scotland and Ireland in 1702, at age thirty-seven, Britain’s last Stuart monarch, and five years later united two of her realms, England and Scotland, as a sovereign state, creating the Kingdom of Great Britain. She had a history of personal misfortune, overcoming ill health (she suffered from crippling arthritis; by the time she became Queen she was a virtual invalid) and living through seventeen miscarriages, stillbirths, and premature births in seventeen years. By the end of her comparatively short twelve-year reign, Britain had emerged as a great power; the succession of outstanding victories won by her general, John Churchill, the Duke of Marlborough, had humbled France and laid the foundations for Britain’s future naval and colonial supremacy. While the Queen’s military was performing dazzling exploits on the continent, her own attention—indeed her realm—rested on a more intimate conflict: the female friendship on which her happiness had for decades depended and which became for her a source of utter torment. At the core of Anne Somerset’s riveting new biography, published to great acclaim in England (“Definitive”—London Evening Standard; “Wonderfully pacy and absorbing”—Daily Mail), is a portrait of this deeply emotional, complex bond between two very different women: Queen Anne—reserved, stolid, shrewd; and Sarah Churchill, Duchess of Marlborough, wife of the Queen’s great general—beautiful, willful, outspoken, whose acerbic wit was equally matched by her fearsome temper. Against a fraught background—the revolution that deposed Anne’s father, James II, and brought her to power . . . religious differences (she was born Protestant—her parents’ conversion to Catholicism had grave implications—and she grew up so suspicious of the Roman church that she considered its doctrines “wicked and dangerous”) . . . violently partisan politics (Whigs versus Tories) . . . a war with France that lasted for almost her entire reign . . . the constant threat of foreign invasion and civil war—the much-admired historian, author of Elizabeth I (“Exhilarating”—The Spectator; “Ample, stylish, eloquent”—The Washington Post Book World), tells the extraordinary story of how Sarah goaded and provoked the Queen beyond endurance, and, after the withdrawal of Anne’s favor, how her replacement, Sarah’s cousin, the feline Abigail Masham, became the ubiquitous royal confidante and, so Sarah whispered to growing scandal, the object of the Queen's sexual infatuation. To write this remarkably rich and passionate biography, Somerset, winner of the Elizabeth Longford Prize for Historical Biography, has made use of royal archives, parliamentary records, personal correspondence and previously unpublished material. Queen Anne is history on a large scale—a revelation of a centuries-overlooked monarch.

Download or read book The Secret Lives of Somerset Maugham written by Selina Hastings and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2012-07-01 with total page 914 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: He was a brilliant teller of tales, one of the most widely read authors of the twentieth century, and at one time the most famous writer in the world, yet W. Somerset Maugham’s own true story has never been fully told. At last, the truth is revealed in a landmark biography by the award-winning writer Selina Hastings. Granted unprecedented access to Maugham’s personal correspondence and to newly uncovered interviews with his only child, Hastings portrays the secret loves, betrayals, integrity, and passion that inspired Maugham to create such classics as The Razor’s Edge and Of Human Bondage. Portrayed in full for the first time is Maugham’s disastrous marriage to Syrie Wellcome, a manipulative society woman who trapped Maugham with a pregnancy and an attempted suicide. Hastings also explores Maugham’s many affairs with men, including his great love, Gerald Haxton, an alcoholic charmer. Maugham’s work in secret intelligence during two world wars is described in fascinating detail—experiences that provided the inspiration for the groundbreaking Ashenden stories. From the West End to Broadway, from China to the South Pacific, Maugham’s remarkably productive life is thrillingly recounted as Hastings uncovers the real stories behind such classics as Rain, The Painted Veil, Cakes & Ale, and other well-known tales.

Download or read book Elizabeth I written by Anne Somerset and published by Anchor. This book was released on 2010-11-10 with total page 1072 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Glitteringly detailed and engagingly written, the magisterial Elizabeth I brings to vivid life the golden age of sixteenth-century England and the uniquely fascinating monarch who presided over it. A woman of intellect and presence, Elizabeth was the object of extravagant adoration by her contemporaries. She firmly believed in the divine providence of her sovereignty and exercised supreme authority over the intrigue-laden Tudor court and Elizabethan England at large. Brilliant, mercurial, seductive, and maddening, an inspiration to artists and adventurers and the subject of vicious speculation over her choice not to marry, Elizabeth became the most powerful ruler of her time. Anne Somerset has immortalized her in this splendidly illuminating account. BONUS MATERIAL: This ebook edition includes an excerpt from Anne Somerset's Queen Anne.

Download or read book Edward VI written by Chris Skidmore and published by Hachette UK. This book was released on 2011-07-21 with total page 367 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The struggle for the soul of England after the death of Henry VIII In the death of Henry VIII, the crown passed to his nine-year-old son, Edward. However, real power went to the Protector, Edward's uncle, the Duke of Somerset. The court had been a hotbed of intrigue since the last days of Henry VIII. Without an adult monarch, the stakes were even higher. The first challenger was the duke's own brother: he seduced Henry VIII's former queen, Katherine Parr; having married her, he pursued Princess Elizabeth and later was accused of trying to kidnap the boy king at gunpoint. He was beheaded. Somerset ultimately met the same fate, after a coup d'etat organized by the Duke of Warwick. Chris Skidmore reveals how the countrywide rebellions of 1549 were orchestrated by the plotters at court and were all connected to the (literally) burning issue of religion: Henry VIII had left England in religious limbo. Court intrigue, deceit and treason very nearly plunged the country into civil war. Edward was a precocious child, as his letters in French and Latin demonstrate. He kept a secret diary, written partly in Greek, which few of his courtiers could read. In 1551, at the age of 14, he took part in his first jousting tournament, an essential demonstration of physical prowess in a very physical age. Within a year it is his signature we find at the bottom of the Council minutes, yet in early 1553 he contracted a chest infection and later died, rumours circulating that he might have been poisoned. Mary, Edward's eldest sister, and devoted Catholic, was proclaimed Queen. This is more than just a story of bloodthirsty power struggles, but how the Church moved so far along Protestant lines that Mary would be unable to turn the clock back. It is also the story of a boy born to absolute power, whose own writings and letters offer a compelling picture of a life full of promise, but tragically cut short.

Download or read book The Wars of the Roses written by Dan Jones and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2014-10-14 with total page 416 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The author of the New York Times bestseller The Plantagenets and The Templars chronicles the next chapter in British history—the historical backdrop for Game of Thrones The inspiration for the Channel 5 series Britain's Bloody Crown The crown of England changed hands five times over the course of the fifteenth century, as two branches of the Plantagenet dynasty fought to the death for the right to rule. In this riveting follow-up to The Plantagenets, celebrated historian Dan Jones describes how the longest-reigning British royal family tore itself apart until it was finally replaced by the Tudors. Some of the greatest heroes and villains of history were thrown together in these turbulent times, from Joan of Arc to Henry V, whose victory at Agincourt marked the high point of the medieval monarchy, and Richard III, who murdered his own nephews in a desperate bid to secure his stolen crown. This was a period when headstrong queens and consorts seized power and bent men to their will. With vivid descriptions of the battles of Towton and Bosworth, where the last Plantagenet king was slain, this dramatic narrative history revels in bedlam and intrigue. It also offers a long-overdue corrective to Tudor propaganda, dismantling their self-serving account of what they called the Wars of the Roses.

Download or read book Somerset Maugham written by Jeffrey Meyers and published by Vintage. This book was released on 2010-04-28 with total page 434 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An instinctive and magnificent storyteller, Somerset Maugham was one of the most popular and successful writers of his time. He published seventy-eight books -- including the undisputed classics Of Human Bondage and The Razor’s Edge -- which sold over 40 million copies in his lifetime. Born in Paris to sophisticated parents, Willie Maugham was orphaned at the age of ten and brought up in a small English coastal town by narrow-minded relatives. He was trained as a doctor, but never practiced medicine. His novel Ashenden, based on his own espionage for Britain in World War I, influenced writers from Eric Ambler to John le Carr?. After a failed affair with an actress, he married another man’s mistress, but reserved his greatest love for a man who shared his life for nearly thirty years. He traveled the world and spoke several languages. Despite a debilitating stutter, and an acerbic and formal manner, he entertained literary celebrities and royalty at his villa in the south of France. He made a fortune from his writing--the short story “Rain” alone earned him a million dollars–yet true critical recognition, and the esteem of his literary peers, eluded him. The life of Somerset Maugham, as told by acclaimed biographer Jeffrey Meyers, is an intriguing, glamorous, complex, and extraordinary account of one of the twentieth century’s most enduring writers. From the Trade Paperback edition.

Download or read book England s Boy King written by Edward VI (King of England) and published by Ravenhall Books. This book was released on 2005 with total page 200 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Throughout Edward's short reign the young ruler kept a journal, a detailed diary recounting events in his kingdom. It is a fascinating record of Tudor England through the eyes of its monarch. The diary narrates all the momentous events in the young king's life but also observes the wider world, noting down news from England and keeping a watchful eye on Ireland, Scotland and mainland Europe.

Download or read book Bury the Chains written by Adam Hochschild and published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. This book was released on 2006 with total page 500 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is the story of a handful of men, led by Thomas Clarkson, who defied the slave trade and ignited the first great human rights movement. Beginning in 1788, a group of Abolitionists moved the cause of anti-slavery from the floor of Parliament to the homes of 300,000 people boycotting Caribbean sugar, and gave a platform to freed slaves.

Download or read book Decline and Fall written by Evelyn Waugh and published by Standard Ebooks. This book was released on 2024-01-01T17:32:52Z with total page 229 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Paul Pennyfeather is a second-year theology student who, as a result of mistaken identity, has his “education discontinued for personal reasons.” He ends up as a schoolmaster at a fourth-rate school, hired despite not meeting any of the qualifications in their advertisement. He there encounters a cornucopia of eccentric characters, including another master who has a wooden leg, a former clergyman with capital-D Doubts, and a servant who tells everyone he’s rich, but with a different tale for each about why he’s posing as a servant. Paul’s time at school leads to romance with a student’s mother, and that in turn leads to enormous complications in Paul’s life. Inspired in part by his own experiences in school and as a schoolmaster, Evelyn Waugh’s first published novel, Decline and Fall, is a dark and occasionally farcical satire of British college life. It’s something of a perverse coming-of-age story, subverting the expected journey and ending that the archetype usually demands. Shining a devastating light on many of the societal struggles of post-WWI Britain, Waugh took his novel’s title from another work that revealed the ineluctable descent of a great society: Gibbons’ The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. Waugh issued a new edition of Decline and Fall in 1960 that contained restored text that was removed by his publisher from the first edition. This Standard Ebooks edition follows the first edition. This book is part of the Standard Ebooks project, which produces free public domain ebooks.

Download or read book Ghosts of Central Jersey written by Gordon Thomas Ward and published by Arcadia Publishing. This book was released on 2008-08-13 with total page 152 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Tour historic sites and buildings in New Jersey—and learn about the spirits that are said to haunt them. Includes photos! Ranging from the shadowed woods of the Somerset Hills to the dappled banks of the Delaware River, Ghosts of Central Jersey delivers a rich mix of factual history and the sound investigation of ghostly phenomena. This collection of reports on local legends and traditional stories informs, entertains, and takes you to places in New Jersey where the past is considered to be very much alive and entwined with the present.

Download or read book Tudor Survivor written by Margaret Scard and published by The History Press. This book was released on 2011-08-26 with total page 250 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: William Paulet is the exemplar of the successful Tudor courtier. For an astonishing 46 years he served at the courts of Henry VIII, Edward VI, Mary and Elizabeth and was one of the men responsible for introducing changes in religious, economic and social issues which shaped England as we know it today. He was a judge at the trials of Fisher and More and a central figure in the intrigues of the succession crisis following Edward VI's reign. Though born a commoner, by his death he was the senior peer in England and, as Lord High Treasurer, held one of the most influential positions at court. Paulet survived a bloody half-century of Tudor politics by making himself indispensable, satisfying the demands of four very different monarchs, while still maintaining his own principles. He watched former friends go to the block whilst he weathered the storms of a changing England. Bringing together the separate strands of biographical study and social history, this book offers a fascinating insight not only into Paulet's long and varied career within the royal household and in government but also, through the innovative use of descriptive scenes, into the many routines and rituals that shaped the everyday life of a Tudor courtier. In Tudor Survivor, Margaret Scard paints a captivating portrait of a great man who for many years held the purse strings of England, and both witnessed and was instrumental in the greatest events of the period. From the Siege of Boulogne to the execution of two queens, the Reformation and the beginnings of Elizabeth's Golden Age, Paulet was there, and the story of his fascinating life reveals the nature of life at the Tudor court set against the politics of the age.