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Arlene Okerlund
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Elizabeth: England's Slandered Queen Paperback – June 1, 2006

by Arlene Okerlund (Author)
4.4 4.4 out of 5 stars 86 ratings
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Elizabeth Wydeville, Queen consort to Edward Iv, has traditionally been portrayed as a scheming opportunist. But was she a cunning vixen or a tragic wife and mother? As this extraordinary biography shows, the first queen to bear the name Elizabeth lived a life of tragedy, love, and loss that no other queen has since endured. This shocking revelation about the survival of one woman through vilification and adversity shows Elizabeth as a beautiful and distraught mother of the two lost Princes in the Tower and an innocent queen slandered by politicians.
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Previous page
  1. Part of series
    England's Forgotten Queens
  2. Print length
    336 pages
  3. Language
    English
  4. Publication date
    June 1, 2006
  5. Dimensions
    4.96 x 0.76 x 7.76 inches
  6. ISBN-10
    0752438077
  7. ISBN-13
    978-0752438078
  8. See all details
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Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Arlene Okerlund, Professor Emerita of English, retired after a career of teaching Renaissance literature at San José State University in California. The author of scholarly articles on Shakespeare, Spenser, Marlowe, Donne, and Dryden, Professor Okerlund also writes for popular audiences, including the newsletter of the Peninsula Banjo Band with which she plays tenor banjo.

Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ The History Press (June 1, 2006)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Paperback ‏ : ‎ 336 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0752438077
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0752438078
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 12.2 ounces
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 4.96 x 0.76 x 7.76 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.4 4.4 out of 5 stars 86 ratings

About the author

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Arlene Okerlund

Arlene Okerlund

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Arlene Okerlund, Professor Emerita of English, retired after a career of teaching Renaissance literature at San José State University in California. After several years in the classroom, she served six years as Dean, College of Humanities and the Arts, and seven years as Academic Vice President before returning to her first loves of teaching and research. The author of scholarly articles on Shakespeare, Spenser, Marlowe, Donne, and Dryden, Professor Okerlund also writes for popular audiences, including the newsletter of the Peninsula Banjo Band with which she plays tenor banjo.

Customer reviews

4.4 out of 5 stars
4.4 out of 5
86 global ratings

Top reviews from the United States

J. Clark
5.0 out of 5 stars Whether Woodville or Wydeville, a Fascinating Subject
Reviewed in the United States on June 17, 2009
Verified Purchase
For a year or two I put off reading this biography of Edward IV's consort because I had recently read David Baldwin's biography of the same person. Now, having finished Okerlund, I have decided that there is room in the world for both biographies of Elizabeth and would encourage anyone interested in the Wars of the Roses, or the queens of England, to read both of them.

Arlene Okerlund is more enthusiastic about, and sympathetic toward, her subject than David Baldwin. Her book is longer and in most respects fuller than Baldwin's. Whether all that has to do with Okerlund's being female I don't know. Unlike Baldwin, Okerlund believes that Elizabeth had a good relationship with her son-in-law Henry VII. She makes the small but excellent point that the queen's family name should be spelled "Wydeville," since that is the version used by Caxton, the first printer in English history, who knew Elizabeth's brother Antony.

Yet, as I was reading Okerlund, I sometimes missed Baldwin's more straightforward approach, and more specifically his summary of Elizabeth's portraits and other "artefacts."

Neither author has the last word on the subject. I am not convinced that Elizabeth was excessively cold-blooded, or meddling, or selfish; neither am I convinced that she was innocent of all such charges. As in the case of Richard III, the jury is still out. Other readers should definitely read both Baldwin and Okerlund and reach their own judgments.
29 people found this helpful
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C. Ferry
5.0 out of 5 stars Probably Everything You Wanted to Know!
Reviewed in the United States on January 31, 2014
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A very well written biography that's hard to put down because it's also a great story. If you want to know about the real Elizabeth Woodville (Wydville), the court of Edward IV, the players in the Wars of the Roses, and to be immersed in 15th century England, this is definitely the book for you. Well researched, with chronologies and family trees in the back for easier reference to help see why some claimants to the throne made their bids for power (like Margaret Beauford and her son Henry Tudor, whose bid for kingship succeeded but was rather tenuous).
Arlene Okerlund gives us a sympathetic look at Queen Elizabeth, who survived a tremendous amount of tragedy in her life, much more than most of us are called on to suffer. That alone is cause to admire a woman who, while living at the heights of prestige in a glittering court as queen consort, also endured loss of family and children through sickness and even murder, and finally escape in sanctuary; and an end that was, if not poverty, then great simplicity in a monastic setting.
While I liked 'The White Queen' as a story, this biography gives us insight into the woman and her world.
9 people found this helpful
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Amanda
4.0 out of 5 stars Saint, or Sinner?
Reviewed in the United States on March 26, 2015
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I have forever enjoyed reading about royal women. Of course, as anyone familiar with powerful women in history knows, there is a tendency to show these women in a much more black and white view than their male counterparts. Women in power are called saints or demons, patterned from Mother Mary or Jezebel. Usually at the same time. While this is a much better balanced biography of Elizabeth compared to others that show her as cruel and calculating, I think this biography swings too much to showing her as a saint. It seems that it has to apologize for Elizabeth's stringent economy of her household and her supposed arrogance. Elizabeth was undoubtedly capable of cruelty and kindness. However, the author superbly captures England's queen who started to bring the Renaissance to England. There can be no more of taking this exquisite woman for granted after this biography.
6 people found this helpful
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Lis
5.0 out of 5 stars Wonderful Insight into the Woodville Family
Reviewed in the United States on March 2, 2010
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This book really opened my eyes to the enduring qualities of Elizabeth Woodville. It was so well written that you hoped for just a moment that history would change! The one person in Elizabeth's life I was made aware of through this book is her brother Anthony. My heart ached for his story. What an accomplished man...and his story really makes you despise Richard III even more.

The history is well told, the story line is easy to follow. You will want to study more of the characters who make up the War of the Roses.
12 people found this helpful
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Amazon Customer
5.0 out of 5 stars Great Grandmother x16, was one very tough lady, I am honored.
Reviewed in the United States on July 21, 2017
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Insightfully and informative! Told me more about my ancestor than any history book ever could!
One person found this helpful
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AJ
3.0 out of 5 stars Trying too hard!
Reviewed in the United States on December 21, 2020
Filled with incredible facts and detail and very easy to read.
I appreciate the effort for trying to put forward a balanced perspective. However, I didn’t find this balanced at all. The author was trying too hard to make a point.....this was more of a crusade. Very biased.....but I believe the author was trying to counter prior biographies. Plenty of facts but highly biased.
One person found this helpful
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D. Coldwell
5.0 out of 5 stars Enjoyed
Reviewed in the United States on April 11, 2014
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I enjoyed this book very much. Arlene Okerlund makes a compelling case for this misunderstood English queen. I couldn't put it down.
2 people found this helpful
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D. Black
5.0 out of 5 stars A must read
Reviewed in the United States on June 26, 2018
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Great book
One person found this helpful
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Top reviews from other countries

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Valerie Whitesell
5.0 out of 5 stars Slandered Yes Forgotten No
Reviewed in Canada on January 5, 2022
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Elizabeth Woodville will never be a forgotten queen, yet she is slandered.
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floriane Bellot
5.0 out of 5 stars très complet et intéressant
Reviewed in France on November 11, 2018
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très beau livre
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nicoletta
5.0 out of 5 stars The most truly book about Elizabeth Woodville
Reviewed in Italy on August 23, 2014
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Fully detailed, with a different point of view (a real one i think) from the other biography about elizabeth woodville.
The best one.
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Greg O'Rilla
5.0 out of 5 stars A brilliant and long overdue book about one of the most maligned women in history
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on March 14, 2014
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This book, meticulously researched and beautifully written, grips the reader from the very first page. Elizabeth Wydeville has always fascinated me, and I have never understood exactly why she has been so vilified, even by historians writing today. At last we see the real Elizabeth, the loving wife and mother who strove to teach her own children the family values she had learned as a child from her own parents. That she succeeded in doing so is apparent from way her daughter Elizabeth of York lovingly brought up her own children.

Arlene Okerlund refutes every tired, clichéd argument regularly trotted out by writers who should know better, showing Elizabeth as a grasping, manipulative woman, pushing her 'greedy' family forward. Now at last we hear the Wydevilles' side of the story; Sir Richard Wydeville's honourable behaviour in refusing to hand Calais over to the Earl of Warwick (now there's a true villain!) until the men of the garrison had been paid, and Anthony's loving care of his nephew Edward at Ludlow, and his place in history as a humanist scholar are just two examples.

What emerges from this book is a picture of a strong woman who knew far too much tragedy in her life, yet never lost her will to live. Sometimes historians have grudgingly admitted that Elizabeth must have suffered when she realised her sons by Edward IV were dead - please tell me what normal parent wouldn't have suffered! This is the first book which speaks of how Elizabeth must have suffered and grieved when her beloved father and her brother John were executed by Warwick for no other reason save revenge. Twice this good and courageous woman endured the privations of life in sanctuary, even giving birth to her much-wanted son Edward whilst there. and striving to do the best for her children.

Let us hope that other historians now take heed of this important book so that Queen Elizabeth Wydeville can at last take her rightful place in history.
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Jane S.
5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent Read
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on December 16, 2019
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A sympathetic and very interesting book about a fascinating woman
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