Matthew Dennison (William Collins, £25)
FOR MANY people, George II— irascible, blustering, self-important—is an indistinct figure in the narrative of British history, sandwiched as he is between the tumultuous Stuarts and the marathon reign of his grandson, George III. In his own lifetime, he was frequently eclipsed by his dynamic consort, Caroline of Ansbach (right), who presided over a vibrant Court that did much to mitigate the Hanoverians’ otherwise well- deserved reputation for philistinism.
With the exception of Anne Boleyn, it can be argued that she was the most consequential queen we have ever had—which makes it even more surprising that her once bright reputation has dimmed to the extent that she is now scarcely remembered at all.
Matthew Dennison’s sparkling new biography should do much to bring Caroline out of the shadows to which she has for so long been consigned. In tracing her story, he conjures the entire panorama of early-18th-century London in its rollicking, rambunctious, often crude but never boring prime.
Arriving on these shores with the accession of George I in 1714, the attractive and charismatic queen-to-be—once described as ‘the most agreeable princess in Germany’—had already imbibed liberal attitudes and intellectual curiosity in the household of death of a ‘Mortification of ye Bowels’ in 1737, Caroline did much to promote Enlightenment values in England through her association with and patronage of leading politicians, philosophers, poets and architects. Within the family circle, her relations with her eldest son, Frederick, were somewhat less harmonious; ‘I wish the ground would open this moment and sink the monster to the lowest hole in Hell,’ she once exclaimed.
Energetic and ambitious, brilliant and divisive, Queen Caroline would have been a remarkable figure in any age. It is fortunate that, in Mr Dennison, she has found a writer able to do justice to her formidable talents. Martin Williams