Recommended reading

I'm at this moment reading Blood and Roses, the story of the Paston family and their famous
letters. The author, Helen Castor, really knows her stuff and has managed to bring a family
that lived over 500 years ago to life. What I really like about this book is the minutia of the
Pastons lives. For example, one of the young Paston wives, missing her husband who is in
London, writes to him 'I wish you were at home liefer than a new gown, though it were of
scarlet'..... and Margaret Paston, getting close to giving birth and the local midwife being
incapacitated with a bad back, writes of her reassurance that she has received a message
from the midwife, who promises she will come... when she is needed 'though she should be
pushed in a barrow' ......... lovely stuff
I'm so glad this book came to my notice and thoughly recommend it....
Eileen

--- In , "eileen"
<ebatesparrot@...> wrote:
>
> I'm at this moment reading Blood and Roses, the story of the Paston
family and their famous
> letters. The author, Helen Castor, really knows her stuff and has
managed to bring a family
> that lived over 500 years ago to life. What I really like about
this book is the minutia of the
> Pastons lives. For example, one of the young Paston wives, missing
her husband who is in
> London, writes to him 'I wish you were at home liefer than a new
gown, though it were of
> scarlet'..... and Margaret Paston, getting close to giving birth
and the local midwife being
> incapacitated with a bad back, writes of her reassurance that she
has received a message
> from the midwife, who promises she will come... when she is needed
'though she should be
> pushed in a barrow' ......... lovely stuff
> I'm so glad this book came to my notice and thoughly recommend it....



Indeed. I wish we had more such collections of the correspondence of
ordinary life. It brings the people to such vivid reality. The Lisle
Letters are a similar collection, though involving people of a higher
stratum of life.

Both these collections, and the Cely Papers and others, came down to
us because they were seized in a lawsuit along with all the
defendant's other records, and never returned to the owners.

Katy

Katy wrote:

> Indeed. I wish we had more such collections of the correspondence of
> ordinary life. It brings the people to such vivid reality. The Lisle
> Letters are a similar collection, though involving people of a higher
> stratum of life.
>
> Both these collections, and the Cely Papers and others, came down to
> us because they were seized in a lawsuit along with all the
> defendant's other records, and never returned to the owners.

Ann:

Don't overlook the Stonor letters.
[ http://www.amazon.com/Kingsfords-Letters-1290-1483-Classic-
Reprints/dp/0521554675/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1215584955&sr=1-3 ]

a special treat are the letters of Thomas Betson, Stonor's son-in-law.
I would love to make him the protagonist of a novel, but couldn't do him
justice.

L.P.H.,

Ann