A Study in Insecurity

Elizabeth I (Penguin Monarchs)

'The experience of insecurity, it turned out, would shape one of the most remarkable monarchs in England's history' 
 
In the popular imagination, as in her portraits, Elizabeth I is the image of monarchical power. But this image is as much armour as a reflection of the truth. In this illuminating account of England's iconic queen, Helen Castor reveals her reign as shaped by a profound and enduring insecurity that was a matter of both practical politics and personal psychology.

Helen Castor is an acclaimed medieval and Tudor historian. Her books include the prize-winning Blood &amp; Roses, She-Wolves: The Women Who Ruled England before Elizabeth, and Joan of Arc, dubbed ‘a triumph of history’. She has presented a range of radio and television programmes for the BBC and Channel 4, including documentaries based on She-Wolves and Joan of Arc. She is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and a Fellow Commoner of Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge, and was a judge for the 2022 Booker Prize. She has one son, and lives in London.

In the popular imagination, as in her portraits, Elizabeth I is the image of monarchical power. The Virgin Queen ruled over a Golden Age: the Spanish Armada was defeated; English explorers reached the ends of the earth; a new Church of England rose from the ashes of past conflict; the English Renaissance bloomed in the genius of Shakespeare, Spenser and Sidney. But the image is also armour. 
 
In this illuminating account of Elizabeth's reign, Helen Castor shows how England's iconic queen was shaped by profound and enduring insecurity-an insecurity which was both a matter of practical political reality and personal psychology. From her precarious upbringing at the whim of a brutal, capricious father and her perilous accession after his death, to the religious division that marred her state and the failure to marry that threatened her line, Elizabeth lived under constant threat. But, facing down her enemies with a compellingly inscrutable public persona, the last and greatest of the Tudor monarchs would become a timeless, fearless queen.

Helen Castor

A riveting account of Richard II and Henry IV’s rivalry... The book of the year

The Telegraph (#1 in The 50 best books of 2024 – ranked)

A wonderful narrative history of England... rich in medieval colour and human detail

A beautifully humane medieval political thriller which happens also to be true

My clear stand-out this year was The Eagle and The Hart... Castor retains the drama of the events superbly

Helen Castor is a master storyteller not only of what she sees as ‘the tragedy’ of their relationship [of Richard II and Henry IV] but also of this most turbulent period in English history, a real-life game of thrones and violent power plays in which one wrong move would cost a careless duke or earl his head and a king his crown. Who said medieval history was boring?

Helen Castor’s The Eagle and the Hart concerns two men – the 14th century king Richard II and his cousin who would be king instead, Henry Bolingbroke – yet it encompasses dozens of characters, hundreds of subplots and some of the most momentous years in English history

My book of the year is Helen Castor’s spellbinding The Eagle and the Hart, a beautifully written and convincingly argued study of first cousins and bitter rivals Richard II and Henry IV. In her ability to evoke time and place, and to get under the skin of medieval power politics, Castor is without equal

Helen Castor’s The Eagle and the Hart is the utterly addictive, gripping tale of a deadly rivalry between two cousins: the “thin-skinned narcissist Richard II” and the charismatic, chivalric Henry IV. The intrigue, turbulence and sheer drama of the Plantagenet age is brough vividly to life throughout. Told with characteristic verve and exceptional scholarship, this is one of the best history books I’ve read in years

A brilliant achievement.... not just a glorious work of history but a gripping and haunting tragedy. She is not, of course, the first writer to have made a drama out of the crisis that brought the Lancastrians to power, but it is the measure of her genius for narrative and character that the tale she tells does not remotely suffer from comparison with Shakespeare... There was no book published this year, novels included, that I found richer in character; no plot more taut

The Eagle and the Hart is packed with drama and incident, but it’s also written with an electrifying sense of the tensions between individuals and institutions, innovation and tradition, legitimacy and tyranny. This is a masterpiece of narrative history

The Eagle and the Hart is a meticulous account of the precariousness of kingship and the psychology of power. It is also a rattlingly good story, told with scholarship and humanity by one of our finest historians

Luminous... a rich and vivid history of the Plantagenet cousins and rivals for the English throne... Helen Castor is a historian of great nuance and meticulous scholarship

An exhaustively researched and beautifully written account... The Eagle and the Hart reads not just as a political epic but as a timely reflection on both the dangers of egomaniacal rulers and the challenges facing those who replace them

A compelling narrative... which conveys the complexities of politics in this fascinating time in exemplary style, with a sharp eye for personality and a profound understanding of the period

The book is astonishingly good. I cannot recommend it highly enough. It is both a gripping, moving, deeply humane study of two contrasting cousins, and a clear-eyed dissection of late medieval England’s polity

Helen Castor is the historian’s historian and the writer’s writer. She combines exceptional scholarship with acute psychological insight and gorgeous, pulsating prose. The Eagle and the Hart is a tour de force: a thrilling tale of royal rivalry and a brilliant dissection of the dark heart of political power – both in the 14th century and for all time

Real page-turning history, this remarkable book has all the scholarship of an academic thesis, yet also all the narrative force of a well-written thriller. This tale of high politics, assassinations, family quarrels, the Peasants’ Revolt, tournaments, foreign wars – and at the heart of it all, the gripping drama of two rivals for one crown – is all told in Helen Castor’s witty and alluring prose style

A sublime combination of scholarship and narrative flair. Ravishing!

Among the front rank of writers producing thoughtful and engaging popular history, Helen Castor... examines complex events and an extensive cast of personalities in clear, uncluttered prose

The Eagle and the Hart brings the 14th century to life in all its gaudy colour, terrifying bloodletting and high drama. A book to feast on

Forget William and Harry. The rivalry between cousins Richard II and Henry IV brought 14th-century England to the brink of destruction – as chronicled in Castor’s gripping dual biography

An utterly gripping and compelling tale of a deadly rivalry, told with Helen Castor's characteristic verve and exceptional scholarship. The intrigue, turbulence and sheer drama of the Plantagenet age is brought vividly to life throughout. One of the best history books I've read in years

A dazzling tour de force of epic royal history: a compulsive, unputdownable real-life thriller, a gripping portrait of ruthless power politics, and a study of British tyranny based on deep archival research and masterful scholarship, a tragedy of personality, paranoia and megalomania written with the delicacy and elegance of one of Britain’s most brilliant historians at the top of her game

If ever a book of history was blessed with contemporary relevance, this one is. The dumbfounding, delusional, narcissistic King Richard; the white-knuckle ride of Henry IV, dogged all the way by notions of illegitimacy. I feel these men could have been ripped from today’s headlines. The book’s great achievement is in the storytelling — the unfolding drama, the secrets of power and ambition so beautifully controlled in the telling. The Eagle and the Hart will be a non-fiction book of the year and will deserve the ovations it is certain to receive. When history is this gripping there’s nothing like it

Phenomenal historian Helen Castor's masterful plume plunges us into the depths of machination and the abyss of tragedy. This is a masterpiece that leaves the reader both satiated and breathless

The Eagle and the Hart makes clear why this consequential moment in English history so captured Shakespeare’s imagination. In recounting the gripping story of how Henry of Bolingbroke came to seize the crown of his cousin Richard II, Helen Castor brings their lives as well as this politically fraught (and still resonant) period to life. It is a massive and deeply researched undertaking, beautifully told, and a richly rewarding read

A stupendous piece of scholarship which brings the high Middle Ages alive

The Tragedy of Richard II and Henry IV

Richard of Bordeaux and Henry Bolingbroke were first cousins, born just three months apart. Their lives were from the beginning entwined. When they were still children, Richard was crowned King Richard II with Henry at his side: a ten-year-old lord in the service of his ten-year-old king. Yet they soon grew up to be opposites: Richard was the white hart, a thin-skinned narcissist, and Henry the eagle, a chivalric hero, a leader who inspired loyalty where Richard inspired only fear. Increasingly threatened by his charismatic cousin, Richard became consumed by the need for total power, and the stage was set for a final confrontation. This is a story about a nation brought to the brink of catastrophe – and two men whose lives were played out in parallel, to devastating effect.

Helen Castor

Praise for The Eagle and the Hart

A riveting account of Richard II and Henry IV’s rivalry... The book of the year

A wonderful narrative history of England... rich in medieval colour and human detail

A beautifully humane medieval political thriller which happens also to be true

A riveting account of Richard II and Henry IV’s rivalry... The book of the year

A wonderful narrative history of England... rich in medieval colour and human detail

A beautifully humane medieval political thriller which happens also to be true

A riveting account of Richard II and Henry IV’s rivalry... The book of the year

A wonderful narrative history of England... rich in medieval colour and human detail

A beautifully humane medieval political thriller which happens also to be true

Books by Helen Castor

Follow penguin

Follow ladybird

Follow puffin

Sign up to the Penguin newsletter