Now is the winter of our discontent
Opening of Shakespeare’s Richard III
Made glorious by this summer sun of York…
Meanwhile in the north… not all of the Renaissance happened in Italy.
Elizabeth of York was glorious summer, indeed. She was the daughter, sister, niece, wife, and mother to kings–and queens. As Alison Weir says, in her fabulous biography of this fascinating linchpin of history:
Elizabeth of York’s role in history was crucial, although in a less chauvinistic age, it would, by right, have been more so.
Alison Weir, Elizabeth of York: A Tudor Queen and Her World
In other words, if she’d been more of Penthesilea type, a bit more Eleanor of the Aquitaine and a bit less Jane Bennett, then maybe she’d have been Queen Elizabeth I. Or, maybe she’d have been thrown in the tower with her brothers. Hard to say.
Continue reading “Y is for York”