There are many movies and books about the famous queens of history, and certainly their life is the stuff of romance. Here I’ll try to give you a list of my favorite queens that does not include Elizabeth, Mary Stuart, Catherine the Great or Cleopatra, but queens whose tumultuous love stories I would like to include as a background in my own romance books. And the steamy medieval romance I will soon publish as R.R. Vane, A Stern Lord for My Lady is set during the reign of Queen Eleanor of Aquitaine, the formidable wife of Henry II.
Here is my list, which begins with Eleanor herself:
1. Eleanor of Aquitaine
Her love story is legendary indeed since she was in her early thirties and had divorced her first husband (King Louis VII of France), and the future King Henry II was only about nineteen when they married. She later warred against him and he imprisoned her for long years. The feisty Eleanor is definitely my favourite queen of all times, and not just because I saw her played by Katharine Hepburn in one my favourite films of all times (The Lion in Winter), but because she was Occitan and is one of the promoters of courtly literature and a patron of medieval troubadours – so she is really the Queen of romance (Let us recall her Court of Love in Poitiers). My book is set at the time of the conflict between Eleanor and three of her sons on the one hand and her royal husband on the other. The heroine in A Stern Lord for My Lady is a supporter of Eleanor, while my hero is on King Henry’s side. Let sparks fly…
2. Matilda of Flanders
This queen that is not so well known and not so often portrayed in books or films was William the Conqueror’s wife and she was thought to be a paragon of medieval virtue. It seems she and William had a very successful marriage based on mutual affection. What strikes me however is how these two met, with chroniclers underlining that Matilda first despised William for being a bastard and disdainfully refused his proposal of marriage. William himself was proud and did not take the insult lightly…I did take inspiration from this romanticized story of the spurned suitor when I wrote A Stern Knight for My Lady. What does a medieval man do when he is grievously insulted by the lady whose hand he seeks? And how should the lady behave when forced to marry a man she despises? Sparks will definitely fly.
3. Marguerite de Valois
Alexandre Dumas’ book La Reine Margot first made me familiar with her story, and then I watched Patrice Chereau’s wonderful film (1994) which is to this day one my favorite movies, with visceral Baroque imagery and smoking hot love scenes. Queen Margot is Caterina de Medici’s daughter and a member of the Valois dynasty, and was married to Henry IV, becoming the queen of Navarre and of France for a while until their divorce. Her love life is legendary, and it is rumored that she saw her lover beheaded in front of her eyes.
4. Boudica
I think there are disagreements about how this queen’s name should be spelled and how it was pronounced, but I read somewhere that boudika is a Celtic word derived from a Proto-Gaelic root which means victory. Whatever the case, this woman is a real icon. I did enjoy Manda Scott’s historical series Boudica when I read it some years ago. It is the story of the Warrior Queen of the Iceni who rebelled against the Romans and I would like to write a romance set in her time some day…I’ve always been a fan of Celtic history and I unfortunately did not get to find as many romance stories as I would have liked set during those times. The research would definitely be challenging, but I’ve always dreamt I could write my own book featuring an appearance from Boudica…
5. Elizabeth Woodville
I confess I became fascinated with the story when I read Philippa Gregory’s books and then became hooked on the excellent TV series The White Queen, with Rebecca Ferguson and Max Irons among others. Woodville’s character is reputed to have been one the great beauties of her age (a true rose), and the King Edward IV married her although she was not a princess and had been married before. Definitely, the next events that led to The Wars of the Roses make a great setting for romance. I am currently writing a fantasy romance inspired by The Wars of the Roses – a sort of transformed Romeo and Juliet, with two people from two rival houses forced to marry, who unwittingly fall in love.
These are the queens whose stories I’d love to explore, and for now, you can have a brief encounter with the feisty Queen Eleanor in A Stern Lord for My Lady which is coming soon…on the 13th of May to be more precise…The cover reveal and the preorder link will soon follow…
