New book on The 3rd Earl of Portsmouth
ConversazioniI Love Jane Austen
Iscriviti a LibraryThing per pubblicare un messaggio.
Questa conversazione è attualmente segnalata come "addormentata"—l'ultimo messaggio è più vecchio di 90 giorni. Puoi rianimarla postando una risposta.
1Chawton
A new book has been published by 'Oneworld Publications' which is attracting very favourable reviews. The book is called 'The Trials of the King of Hampshire: Madness, Secrecy and Betrayal in Georgian England' and the author is by the well-respected academic Elizabeth Foyster. The hardback's ISBN is 978-1780749600.
The relevance to Jane Austen is that the book's subject, John-Charles Wallop (1767-1853), later an unfortunate Earl of Portsmouth, was a pupil for a few months in 1773 of The Reverend George Austen at Steventon, where he boarded with the Austen family.
The Austen family got to know the young man well and Mrs Austen (Jane's mother) noted that he stammered and was very backward for his age. The Austens followed what happened to him after he had left their care and Jane Austen refers to him in her letters.
Warning - The story of the Earl's life has some very grim aspects indeed and is not suitable for young readers or those with ... much sensibility.
The Amazon summary of the book - with some minor editing - is as follows:
'Every family has its skeletons, but in 1823 the grand Wallop family was about to share theirs with the world. The 3rd earl of Portsmouth was a peculiar man but, by most accounts, a harmless one. An aristocrat of enormous wealth, he kept company with England’s most famous names, inviting Jane Austen to balls and having Lord Byron as chief witness to his second marriage. For the first fifty years of his life he had moved with ease in high society, but at the age of fifty-five his own family set out to have him declared insane.
Elizabeth Foyster invites us into Freemasons’ Hall for the most extraordinary, expensive and controversial British insanity trial ever heard. Amid accusations of abductions, blackmail and violence, jurors have to decide if Portsmouth is just a shy, stammering eccentric with foolish habits or a sinister madman attempting to mask his dangerous and immoral nature. Both provocative and heart-rending, The Trials of the King of Hampshire goes beyond the fate of a single man to question Georgian society and examine the treatment of the mentally ill and disabled both then and now.'
Disclaimer - I have no financial interest in this recommendation.
The relevance to Jane Austen is that the book's subject, John-Charles Wallop (1767-1853), later an unfortunate Earl of Portsmouth, was a pupil for a few months in 1773 of The Reverend George Austen at Steventon, where he boarded with the Austen family.
The Austen family got to know the young man well and Mrs Austen (Jane's mother) noted that he stammered and was very backward for his age. The Austens followed what happened to him after he had left their care and Jane Austen refers to him in her letters.
Warning - The story of the Earl's life has some very grim aspects indeed and is not suitable for young readers or those with ... much sensibility.
The Amazon summary of the book - with some minor editing - is as follows:
'Every family has its skeletons, but in 1823 the grand Wallop family was about to share theirs with the world. The 3rd earl of Portsmouth was a peculiar man but, by most accounts, a harmless one. An aristocrat of enormous wealth, he kept company with England’s most famous names, inviting Jane Austen to balls and having Lord Byron as chief witness to his second marriage. For the first fifty years of his life he had moved with ease in high society, but at the age of fifty-five his own family set out to have him declared insane.
Elizabeth Foyster invites us into Freemasons’ Hall for the most extraordinary, expensive and controversial British insanity trial ever heard. Amid accusations of abductions, blackmail and violence, jurors have to decide if Portsmouth is just a shy, stammering eccentric with foolish habits or a sinister madman attempting to mask his dangerous and immoral nature. Both provocative and heart-rending, The Trials of the King of Hampshire goes beyond the fate of a single man to question Georgian society and examine the treatment of the mentally ill and disabled both then and now.'
Disclaimer - I have no financial interest in this recommendation.
