Richards marriage to Anne
Richards marriage to Anne
2012-10-23 02:32:02
Someone mentioned there is a current book detailing Annes unpleasant marriage years to Richard. I was saddened to learn this, hoping that they had a quiet happy time before the Reign. Can someone list some details as to this situation, as presented in the book?
Re: Richards marriage to Anne
2012-10-23 04:28:11
--- In , Carol Darling <cdarlingart1@...> wrote:
>
> Someone mentioned there is a current book detailing Annes unpleasant marriage years to Richard. I was saddened to learn this, hoping that they had a quiet happy time before the Reign. Can someone list some details as to this situation, as presented in the book?
>
Carol responds:
Actually, Richard's marriage to Anne appears to have been happy (though they must have been saddened by their inability to have more than one child, and they were both devastated by their son's death).
Don't let the novelists fool you. I strongly recommend reading Kendall's biography of Richard before you explore the murky waters of fiction, which are still mostly tainted by the traditional hostile view of Richard. Don't forget that Richard and Anne were first cousins once removed and that he lived with her family as a boy. They knew each other well.
What must have been hell for Anne was not marriage to Richard but her forced marriage to Edward of Lancaster, whom she had probably been taught to hate or at least despise. Anne's father, Warwick, would have held Edward's mother, Margaret of Anjou, responsible for the deaths of his father and brother (just as Richard and his brothers, who were in the identical situation, would have done. He had also accused her son Edward of being fathered by the Duke of Somerset rather than Henry VI. Yet, suddenly, Warwick does an about-face, allies himself with the hated Margaret against6 his Yorkist cousins and wants poor Anne to marry Margaret's purportedly illegitimate son!
(By the way, I'm not taking sides here. Both Edward and Warwick displayed what I'll euphemistically call a lack of judgement here. But I'm trying to present Anne's perspective. Whether or not she loved her cousin Richard, she certainly would have preferred him to a boy she'd been taught to hate. (Richard, by the way, was just one year older than Edward of Lancaster, almost to the day.) And the one description I can recall of Edward L. runs something like "This boy talks about nothing except war and cutting off heads." Somehow, I don't think that Anne shed any tears when he died. But her emotions when her father and uncle died in battle against her cousins must have been unbearable, and Richard must have wondered how she would feel about marrying him under those circumstances.
Anyway, best to have some background before you read the novels. That way, you'll know what's worth reading and what isn't.
Carol
>
> Someone mentioned there is a current book detailing Annes unpleasant marriage years to Richard. I was saddened to learn this, hoping that they had a quiet happy time before the Reign. Can someone list some details as to this situation, as presented in the book?
>
Carol responds:
Actually, Richard's marriage to Anne appears to have been happy (though they must have been saddened by their inability to have more than one child, and they were both devastated by their son's death).
Don't let the novelists fool you. I strongly recommend reading Kendall's biography of Richard before you explore the murky waters of fiction, which are still mostly tainted by the traditional hostile view of Richard. Don't forget that Richard and Anne were first cousins once removed and that he lived with her family as a boy. They knew each other well.
What must have been hell for Anne was not marriage to Richard but her forced marriage to Edward of Lancaster, whom she had probably been taught to hate or at least despise. Anne's father, Warwick, would have held Edward's mother, Margaret of Anjou, responsible for the deaths of his father and brother (just as Richard and his brothers, who were in the identical situation, would have done. He had also accused her son Edward of being fathered by the Duke of Somerset rather than Henry VI. Yet, suddenly, Warwick does an about-face, allies himself with the hated Margaret against6 his Yorkist cousins and wants poor Anne to marry Margaret's purportedly illegitimate son!
(By the way, I'm not taking sides here. Both Edward and Warwick displayed what I'll euphemistically call a lack of judgement here. But I'm trying to present Anne's perspective. Whether or not she loved her cousin Richard, she certainly would have preferred him to a boy she'd been taught to hate. (Richard, by the way, was just one year older than Edward of Lancaster, almost to the day.) And the one description I can recall of Edward L. runs something like "This boy talks about nothing except war and cutting off heads." Somehow, I don't think that Anne shed any tears when he died. But her emotions when her father and uncle died in battle against her cousins must have been unbearable, and Richard must have wondered how she would feel about marrying him under those circumstances.
Anyway, best to have some background before you read the novels. That way, you'll know what's worth reading and what isn't.
Carol
Richard III on Amazon
As an Amazon Associate, We earn from qualifying purchases.