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A review by amber2020
Elizabeth I and Her Circle by Susan Doran
2.0
Doran's factual knowledge and research is evident throughout the text however her choice of layout severely hinders the depth of her analysis. She goes to great lengths in her introduction to justify her decision not to write the book chronologically, instead splitting it into sections by the relationship to the queen which the subjects of the book held e.g. family, courtiers, privy council members. This had great potential; I've seen it work in the past and welcomed it with celebration in my undergraduate days of trawling through texts for evidence, but here it caused confusion and repetition.
The main shortfall of Doran's approach is that she never found a way of contextualising information in each section without retelling the story of what Elizabeth herself was doing at that moment. I'm far from an expert in Elizabethan history however I have a good grasp of it and in all honesty I only need to read about her reaction to Mary Queen of Scots death once in a text. I would expect going into the book that Doran would then spend the chapters on Privy Council members dealing with their involvement in this episode and other matters in-depthly rather than telling me again what Elizabeth's reaction was. In these moments I'm not supposed to be diverting attention back to Elizabeth but Doran's contextualisation attempts go beyond their remit and are distracting; editing would have severely aided this. Confusion arises also as it is hard to keep track of who she is analysing - this was exacerbated by the fact I was listening to an audiobook and could not flick back and check relationships and titles etcetera but it does also stem from her frequent breaks from the analysis of characters for contextual purposes.
Despite the fact it was split to allow clarity and increased depth of analysis I feel it lacked both in places. In speaking about the ladies Elizabeth surrounded herself with, Doran split them well, dealing with one and moving on however in other sections she jumped from one person to another and back again which made it difficult to know who she was referring to, particularly when they began to change titles in their later careers.
Ironically though she back referenced overly in many places she failed to in vital places. During the chapters on her 'ladies in waiting' I struggled to remember exactly which of them had the scandalous marriages which were referenced in her earlier chapters on their husbands, a fault of my own memory, yes, but also of the book as only a sentence would have been needed to reference it.
Overall I found myself not enjoying this text and it was a chore to finish it, which is a pity as I'm interested in the period and find Elizabeth I fascinating.
The main shortfall of Doran's approach is that she never found a way of contextualising information in each section without retelling the story of what Elizabeth herself was doing at that moment. I'm far from an expert in Elizabethan history however I have a good grasp of it and in all honesty I only need to read about her reaction to Mary Queen of Scots death once in a text. I would expect going into the book that Doran would then spend the chapters on Privy Council members dealing with their involvement in this episode and other matters in-depthly rather than telling me again what Elizabeth's reaction was. In these moments I'm not supposed to be diverting attention back to Elizabeth but Doran's contextualisation attempts go beyond their remit and are distracting; editing would have severely aided this. Confusion arises also as it is hard to keep track of who she is analysing - this was exacerbated by the fact I was listening to an audiobook and could not flick back and check relationships and titles etcetera but it does also stem from her frequent breaks from the analysis of characters for contextual purposes.
Despite the fact it was split to allow clarity and increased depth of analysis I feel it lacked both in places. In speaking about the ladies Elizabeth surrounded herself with, Doran split them well, dealing with one and moving on however in other sections she jumped from one person to another and back again which made it difficult to know who she was referring to, particularly when they began to change titles in their later careers.
Ironically though she back referenced overly in many places she failed to in vital places. During the chapters on her 'ladies in waiting' I struggled to remember exactly which of them had the scandalous marriages which were referenced in her earlier chapters on their husbands, a fault of my own memory, yes, but also of the book as only a sentence would have been needed to reference it.
Overall I found myself not enjoying this text and it was a chore to finish it, which is a pity as I'm interested in the period and find Elizabeth I fascinating.