The Fears of Henry IV - Couverture rigide

Mortimer, Ian

Couverture rigide

ISBN 10 : 0224073001 ISBN 13 : 9780224073004

Editeur : Jonathan Cape Ltd, 2007

A propos du livre

Présentation de l'éditeur :

An author with a strong track record now tackles the turbulent reign of Henry IV, the first Lancastrian king.

By 1405, King Henry IV had already survived at least eight plots to dethrone or kill him in the first six years of his reign. Henry had not always been so unpopular. The son of John of Gaunt, he was courteous, confident, well-educated, musical and spiritually fervent. In 1399, at the age of thirty-two, he was enthusiastically greeted as the saviour of the realm when he ousted from power the insecure and tyrannical King Richard II.

Therein lay Henry’s weakness. By making himself King he had broken God’s law and left himself starkly open to criticism. Enemies everywhere tried to take advantage of his questionable right to the crown. Such overwhelming threats transformed him from a hero into a duplicitous murderer: a king prepared to go to any lengths to save his family and his throne.

But against all the odds, what Henry achieved was to take a poorly ruled nation, establish a new Lancastrian dynasty, and introduce the principle that a king must act in accordance with Parliament. He might not have been the most glorious king England ever had, but he was one of the bravest, and certainly the greatest survivor of them all.

Revue de presse :

"[Mortimer] has an instinctive sympathy for the men about whom he writes, a real understanding of the mentalities of late medieval England, and a vivid historical imagination which lends colour and excitement to his pages" (Literary Review)

"Mortimer's book is a success and tells an important story very well" (Richard Francis Daily Telegraph)

"An arresting and original biography" (Jessie Childs Sunday Telegraph)

"[It] possesses the rare combination of clarity, liveliness, balanced judgement, erudition without pedantry, and scholarship founded on his own research among primary sources" (Scotland on Sunday)

"The book is at its most compelling in conjuring a sense of place or occasion" (Guardian)

À propos de cette édition

• Éditeur: Jonathan Cape Ltd
• Date d'édition: 2007
• ISBN 10: 0224073001
• ISBN 13: 9780224073004
• Reliure: Relié
• Nombre de pages: 496