A few times, it felt like we're made privy to Jones' personal positive feelings about Britain and it's history. I'm not sure it's his intention but it comes across that way. A new era appeared to dawn in 1509, with the accession of Henry VIII, heir to both Lancaster and York, but still the old fears ran deep. After an early attempt to bring the extended royal family together to turn the nobility's minds towards that perennial delight, war with France, dissensions from Henry's policies began to emerge. Nevertheless, Jones contends, the main focus was no longer the old one of York v. Lancaster, but, increasingly, families were divided between Catholic and Protestant. The final purge of possible claimants to the throne in 1538 – 41 when Montague, Exeter and the aged Countess of Salisbury were executed was the last effusion of Plantagenet blood.

Dan Jones has done something with this book that is not usually achieved. He has taken almost three centuries of history and made them accessible and understandable to the non-historian. His style of narrative nonfiction was at times as captivating as any novel with brilliant analysis of what drove people to the roles that they played. At first Henry VI, seemed merely gentle and weak. As a young man he was a loving – if not very potent - husband to his loyal wife, Margaret of Anjou, and a kindly half-brother to the recent, and very embarrassing, Tudor additions to the royal family. His widowed mother had married a Welshman ‘of no birth neither of livelihood’, one Owen Tudor, with whom she had fallen in love after he had fallen drunk into her lap at a party (or so legend had it). He spent the rest of the day and also the whole of the following night in bitterness of soul, given over to prayer and sleeplessness, and continuing his fast for three days...With this extraordinary show of public penance Henry had won the most important propaganda battle of the war. PDF / EPUB File Name: The_Hollow_Crown__The_Wars_of_the_Roses_an_-_Dan_Jones.pdf, The_Hollow_Crown__The_Wars_of_the_Roses_an_-_Dan_Jones.epub Dan Jones’s The Plantagenets is an excellent example of historical writing that strives in equal measure to entertain as well as teach. Written with an eye for character, an appreciation of tangled palace intrigue, and an abiding respect for the occasionally gruesome battle or execution, this is closer to the script of a premium cable show than a doctoral dissertation. For that, I am most appreciative.

Unlike most historians, Mr. Jones ends the story of the Plantagenets with the disposition of Richard II, another king who irritated his nobles and lost his wars, by his cousin Henry Bolingbroke ( Henry IV ). He justifies this with the fact the Richard II was the last king of the senior male Plantagenet line. Henry was the son of one of Edward III’s younger sons, John of Gaunt – Duke of Lancaster His son Edward II is a weak, ineffectual ruler who surrounds himself with his young peers who prove to be unsuccessful in guiding Edward or the affairs of England. He prefers the company of his friends, such as Piers Gaveston, rather than his Queen Isabella, daughter of the King of France. She is not amused with his behavior nor in the way he treats her. She feels more like a maidservant who is getting bent over a chaise lounge from time to time rather than a daughter of a king. When the time is ripe, with the help of her husband’s numerous enemies, she overthrows him and installs her son as king. Rumor has it that she had her husband killed by having a hot poker inserted up his rectum as a commentary on his preference for his male friends, but Dan Jones believes this is just a story to further discredit her husband and strengthen her son’s hold on power. Books of the Year 2011: History Books". The Daily Telegraph. London. 21 November 2011 . Retrieved 11 February 2012. As far as I could tell, every Plantagenet story has a fitting twist to the tale. For example, take the story of Stephen and Matilda (well, Empress Matilda. Confusingly, there are at least four important Matildas in the full story). When Henry I realized he had no male heir, he chose his daughter Matilda as his successor. After all, she was already an empress and an experienced administrator, even if she did have the undeniable character flaw of being female. Henry I, sensing storms ahead, made all his barons swear fealty to his daughter Matilda--twice. Even so, as soon as he died, Cousin Stephen stepped in, and, being male, promptly swayed the lords to his banner. After a decades-long civil war, Matilda retreated to France--and sent over her son, Henry II, who had the sterling qualifications of not only being the rightful heir, but also of being male. After a few brief and decisive victories, Stephen was forced to take the humiliating course of naming Henry II as heir over his own children. He died knowing his attempt at dynasty had failed, and that Matilda's long game had paid out.

The Hollow Crown: Shakespeare's History Plays – About the Series". PBS. 9 July 2013 . Retrieved 12 October 2013.As he gets to the later stages of the Wars, Mr. Jones takes on the traditional view of Richard III. Although I felt the author is sympathetic to reasons Richard usurped the throne of his nephew, Edward V. He does sup Here we see that these wars of the roses, occurred not as a direct attempt to steal the crown, but it all began to hold together a crumbling kingdom that had once seemed the most secure in all the world. The steps taken by the emerging factions of York and Lancaster grew into a self perpetuating downward spiral of increasing hostility, that created a monstrous vendetta and suddenly the entire kingdom was drawn into a titanic struggle not to save the Kingdom, but for the crown itself, which cost many countless lives. Eventually destroyed them both and made way for the Tudors. I have read a few of Dan Jones' books and have concluded that he is a rare, very rare, scholar. Jones understands that histories should never be written for the benefit of other scholars. What purpose does a history serve if only a small group of academics ever read it? Jones clearly thinks otherwise and writes his books to be read by the average book-buying reader that also might be a history geek or could become one if histories weren't so esoteric. Because of this attitude I will buy anything this man writes. I don't know that I entirely agree with the blurb of Dan Jones' The Plantagenets. Compelling and fascinating are certainly accurate, but gripping and vivid are a bit of a stretch. I mean no offense to Jones, his work is really very interesting, but we are talking about a piece that covers more than three hundred and sixty years of history. It's a lot to absorb and doesn't lend itself to edge-of-your-seat, obsessive, got-to-know-what-happens-next, must-finish-this-chapter-before-going-to-bed type reading.

As royal authority disintegrated in the 1440s and 1450s, there was growing discontent, and personal feuds between members of the nobility began to get out of hand – a situation not helped by Henry's wife, Marguerite of Anjou. It is hard not to admire some aspects of Marguerite's character as Jones presents her. She was phenomenally brave, determined and resolute in her attempts to protect the throne for her husband and son, but she was violently partisan, and, rather than rising above Court rivalries, she made the situation far worse. Lawson, Mark (29 June 2012). "The Hollow Crown: as good as TV Shakespeare can get?". The Guardian . Retrieved 28 August 2013. a tall, bumptious teenager [who] liked to wear a sprig of bright yellow broom blossom (Planta genista in Latin) in his hair...Despite all this [his bride, Henry I's daughter] Mathilda was underwhelmed. Geoffrey was eleven years her junior, and Normans saw Angevins as barbarians who murdered priests, desecrated churches, and had appalling table manners. The publishers have managed to stamp the book with the imprimatur of some impressive heavyweights, including David Starkey and Simon Sebag-Montefiore. These things always seem slightly over the top to me - clearly solicited in advance rather than drawn from a published review - , almost hysterical in their approbation. The latter, for example, describes The Plantagenets as ‘outstanding’, a judgement echoed by Helen Castor, the best-selling author of She Wolves. (It must be so: it says so on the cover!) There are many highlights, but I especially enjoyed the sections that covered the reigns of Edward II and Richard II, two disastrous rulers. Fans of Shakespeare’s play RICHARD II will want to revisit that text after reading this book, and the revisit will be richer for it.With the House of Lancaster wiped out in the legitimate male line, only the fourteen-year old Henry Tudor is left to represent the Lancastrian cause, and he is driven into exile in Brittany. ‘

Jones, Daniel Gwynne. Who's Who. 2021. doi: 10.1093/ww/9780199540884.013.U276782. ISBN 978-0-19-954088-4 . Retrieved 13 July 2021. And then there's Edward II, who gave so many honours and jewels and important jobs to his "dear friend" Piers Gaveston that everyone else in the kingdom, including his wife, started to feel left out. Jones takes the conservative view that Edward and Gaveston might just have been Really (Really) Good Friends, but I have my doubts. If only the lords had taken the sensible course advised by Mitchell and Webb, yet another civil war might have been avoided.of the most beautiful and powerful men and women of England and Normandy board The White Ship to travel from Normandy to England. They are exuberantly drunk, and the crew of the ship is also three sheets to the wind. Out of all of these important people, there is one who is head and shoulders more important than the rest...William the Aetheling, named for his grandfather William the Conqueror. He is the heir apparent to the throne of England. The Plantagenets By Dan Jones tells the story of the first eight Plantagenet monarchs that ruled England between 1154 and 1399, beginning with Henry I and ending at the fall of Richard II. Each monarch in turn has his story told; which wars he fought in, the land he gained and lost, who he married and who his children were. A king who fights to defend his right has a better claim on his inheritance. Struggle and largesse allow a king to gain glory and territory.” --Bertran de Born Essex Dogs by Dan Jones: 9780593653784 | PenguinRandomHouse.com: Books". PenguinRandomhouse.com . Retrieved 20 September 2022.