Lost in execution
Philippa Gregory’s new saga shows she’s running low on riveting royalty.
If you choose to write about lesserknown historical figures, it pays to make their story at least as interesting as the famous characters around them. Philippa Gregory’s most successful foray into this territory was The Other Boleyn Girl, the tale of Anne’s sister’s
fight to keep her head connected to her body. In The Last Tudor, Gregory brings us the Grey sisters – Jane, Katherine and Mary – whose eligibility as heirs to the English throne makes their lives uncomfortable and, in the case of Lady Jane Grey, short.
The novel is narrated in turn by each of the sisters. Jane’s nine-day stint as queen sees her despatched early by Bloody Queen Mary, and we shift to Katherine. Painted at the start by sanctimonious Jane as frivolous and boy-crazy, Katherine is forced to mature, although only to a point. Her decision to act mostly on impulse proves risky under the vengeful eye of her cousin, now Elizabeth I. The youngest Grey, diminutive Mary, brings the novel to a close, and her cool eye and level head make her a more restful companion than her sisters.
But, alas, no more interesting. Gregory uses the girls, particularly Katherine and Mary, to report lengthily and in detail on the political manoeuvring and scandals
occurring at the time. Many pages are given over to Elizabeth I’s dalliance with sexy Robert Dudley (shades of Blackadder’s Lord Flashheart), her manipulation of foreign suitors and her feud with Mary, Queen of Scots, who is herself having a high old time off stage, raising armies and despatching husbands. Each of these storylines is more exciting than the lives of the sisters, which isn’t the ideal way to hold reader interest. It doesn’t help that every female character seems to be called Mary, Jane or Katherine. Obviously, the historical pool of names was limited, but Gregory would have done both reader and book a favour by culling the odd extraneous Mary.
It’s also unsettling to see Elizabeth I portrayed narrowly as paranoid, spiteful and capricious. She may well have had all those qualities, but she also presided over one of the greatest periods in English history, and to see her reduced to a petty, vicious cow feels underwhelming and borderline misogynist.
Gregory certainly knows her material, so readers should be assured that the details and events are accurate and that she’s made her best guess about what’s gone unrecorded. But this novel feels too much like a dull history lesson to truly move.
And there’s simply not enough Robert Dudley.
THE LAST TUDOR, by Philippa Gregory (Simon & Schuster, $37.99)