The Myth of "Bloody Mary": The First Queen of England

Linda Porter's biography examines Mary Tudor, daughter of Henry VIII and Katherine of Aragon, who became the first queen to rule England in her own right. Mary was a cultured Renaissance princess, Latin scholar, and accomplished musician with a passion for fashion and gambling. Porter draws on contemporary documents and recent scholarship to move beyond the popular image of Mary as "Bloody Mary," remembered for burning Protestant heretics. The biography explores how Mary learned politics under difficult circumstances, facing cruelty from her father and pressure from powerful figures during her brother Edward VI's reign. An audacious coup brought her to the throne, which she maintained through strength and determination. Mary married Philip of Spain in a significant political union. Her efforts to strengthen England domestically and internationally were interrupted by her death at age forty-two. Porter's account, the first popular biography of Mary in thirty years, presents her as a complex historical figure whose sophistication and will have been overlooked for centuries.