Splendor and Intrigue in the Georgian Court at Kensington Palace
May 24, 2010
The nasty spats of Charles and Diana pale in comparison to the bloody family battles waged by the prince's dysfunctional ancestors, Georges I and II. Fathers turned against sons and vice versa, and family quarrels led to expulsions from the royal palaces. A respected if not popular sovereign but a diabolical husband and father, George I denied his adulterous wife access to her young son, the future George II, and imprisoned her for 33 years in a remote German castle. George II himself endured a forced separation from his son, Frederick, yet when years later the grown Frederick arrived in London, George banned him from the palaces as he had been banned by his father. Worsley (Cavalier), chief curator at the Historic Royal Palaces, recreates the first two Georgian courts, depicting rival royal mistresses; a disaffected equerry; a "wild," probably autistic boy found in the woods and kept as a pet by George II's wife; and scheming courtiers, as well as Kensington Palace's various architectural renovations. Although some of the court minutiae are too trivial or esoteric for modern consumption, Worsley overall serves up a tasty slice of 18th-century life that is colorful, gossipy, and authoritative. Color illus.
August 1, 2010
In 1725, England's George I commissioned court painter William King to decorate the grand staircase of Kensington Palace. The resulting trompe l'oeil mural included 45 portraits of royal servants from clerks to maids of honor. Worsley (chief curator, Historic Royal Palaces; Cavalier: A Tale of Chivalry, Passion, and Great Houses) focuses on some of the portrayed figures as she tells the story of court life from 1714 to 1760, in the time of the battling father and son, George I and George II, German-speaking rulers brought to England with the demise of the Stuarts. Among those whose lives are followed: George II's mistress Henrietta Howard, who served as woman of the bedchamber to his tolerant wife, Queen Caroline; the beautiful maid of honor Molly Lepell, who ran off with resident court cynic John Hervey; a "wild boy" kept as a pet by the king; and George I's Turkish valets Mustapha and Mohammed. VERDICT In contrast to Worsley's brilliantly organized, meticulously researched Cavalier, this book does not flow well; it is rambling and unfocused, a gossipy account of Hanoverian court life suitable for reading perhaps by some royal watchers but not likely to satisfy those most interested in the era.--Stewart Desmond, New York
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