Quotes by Alison Weir

“If only they would all just leave me alone with my books and my letters, I would be content to let life, and the world pass me by”

“News of the death of James V on 14 December gave even further cause for rejoicing, because his heir was a week-old girl, the infant Mary, Queen of Scots. Scotland would be subject to yet another we...”

“In this martial world dominated by men, women had little place. The Church's teachings might underpin feudal morality, yet when it came to the practicalities of life, a ruthless pragmatism often ca...”

“Court life for a queen of France at that time was, however, stultifyingly routine. Eleanor found that she was expected to be no more than a decorative asset to her husband, the mother of his heirs ...”

“They inhabited a lost world of splendour and brutality, a world dominated by religious change, in which there were few saints.”

“Arthur managed to speak to his grandmother [Queen Eleanor of England], demanding that she evacuate the castle with all her possessions and then go peaceably wherever she wished, for he wanted to sh...”

“Until quite recently women's histories were largely overlooked but in the wake of feminism there has been increasing interest in retrieving them.”

“His handsome face is suffused with rage. He stands before me shaking, then to my disgust, bursts into noisy tears; "I shall tell my mother of you!" he sobs and crashes out of the chamber”

“Often, little brother, there is no smoke without fire.”

“I prefer to be left alone with my books.”

“If silences could be pregnant, then this one went to full term.”

“There can have been no doubt in Eleanor's mind as to what was expected of her as a wife. In her day, women were supposed to be chaste both inside and outside marriage, virginity and celibacy being ...”

“Perhaps the Queen's prayers, and those of Bernard, had been efficacious, or perhaps Louise had been more attentive in bed, for during 1145--the exact date is not recorded--she bore a daughter, who ...”

“... only one man could have been responsible for their deaths: Richard III.”

“A husband or wife did not have the right either to demand sex from his or her spouse or to refuse it, and there was a catalogue of forbidden sexual practices, notably homosexuality, bestiality, cer...”

“After the dedication, Eleanor saw Bernard privately, probably at her own request. He came prepared to offer more spiritual comfort, thinking that she too might be suffering qualms of conscience ove...”

“Was I right?" she asked him. "Was I right to make a stand against what I believed to be wrong? Even though many ills have come from it? I have been asking myself this a lot lately. I must be quiet ...”

“Giraldus claimed that he had heard about Eleanor's adultery with Geoffrey from the saintly Bishop Hugh of Lincoln, who had learned of it from Henry II of England, Geoffrey's son and Eleanor's secon...”

“At school, up to the age of sixteen, I found history boring, for we were studying the Industrial Revolution, which was all about Acts, Trade Unions and the factory system, and I wanted to know abou...”

“In the South of England northerners were regarded then as uncouth, brutish, undisciplined savages ...”