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Mary Queen of Scots passed her childhood in France and married the Dauphin to become Queen of France at the age of sixteen. Widowed less than two years later, she returned to Scotland as Queen after an absence of thirteen years.
Her life then entered its best known phase: the early struggles with John Knox, and the unruly Scottish nobility; the fatal marriage to Darnley and his mysterious death; her marriage to Bothwell, the chief suspect, that led directly to her long English captivity at the hands of Queen Elizabeth; the poignant and extraordinary story of her long imprisonment that ended with the labyrinthine Babington plot to free her, and her execution at the age of forty-four.
Read by Patricia Hodge
(p) 2002 Orion Publishing Group
Her life then entered its best known phase: the early struggles with John Knox, and the unruly Scottish nobility; the fatal marriage to Darnley and his mysterious death; her marriage to Bothwell, the chief suspect, that led directly to her long English captivity at the hands of Queen Elizabeth; the poignant and extraordinary story of her long imprisonment that ended with the labyrinthine Babington plot to free her, and her execution at the age of forty-four.
Read by Patricia Hodge
(p) 2002 Orion Publishing Group
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Reviews
Before biography was fashionable, Antonia Fraser made the past popular
The irreplaceable classic biography
[A] ground-breaking biography ... One of the greatest international bestsellers of the post-war period, Mary Queen of Scots ... launched Fraser's now award-studded career, and single-handedly created a new publishing genre ... The true golden age of British biography really began with the publication of Mary Queen of Scots and it won't end so long as Fraser keeps tapping away on her ancient Smith Corona
Lady Antonia Fraser tells Mary's story movingly and yet with scholarship, insight and balance. It is the sort of biography of Mary which has long been needed
Fraser is at her best here, lucid, authoritative and compassionate
Antonia Fraser is deservedly regarded by many as one of today's finest biographers¿. Listening to the new cd recording of an abridged version of Fraser's biography, Mary Queen of Scots, reminded me just how good she is. The opening and closing music immediately helps create the period, and this coupled with Patricia Hodge's excellent narration, to my mind, is a shining example of how the audio book can surpass it's print counterpart.
Lady Fraser brings intuitive insight and humble self projection to this period without losing historical balance. She gives us imaginative vitality and the historical edifice at once
This is a fine biography, sympathetic without sentimentality, and with a keen awareness of the texture of its subject's world