Elizabeth & Georgiana: The Duke of Devonshire & his Two Duchesses [Import] [Hardcover]

Caroline and Jane Dormer Chapman (Author)

Product Details

• Hardcover: 304 pages
• Publisher: John Murray (2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0719560446
• ISBN-13: 978-0719560446
• Product Dimensions: 9.5 x 6.5 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,904,615 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Biased account, November 29, 2005

By 

Plantagenet Palliser "trumpet man" (Sturbridge, MA) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Elizabeth & Georgiana: The Duke of Devonshire and His Two Duchesses (Hardcover)

I suppose few people really care now that Lady Elizabeth Foster finally got her man. This book is nonetheless a caution to historians dependent upon family archives for primary source material. Laudatory bias is bound to creep in somewhere. As the previous reviewer noted, Bess does not come across so attractively in other biographies, even those written about Georgiana's niece, Lady Caroline Lamb. The book's positives have already been noted: good descriptions of aristocratic society and travel in the 18th century. The book is not, however, good history or even good biography.

10 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Better View of Bess, September 11, 2003

By 

Andrea L. Kohler (Phoenix, AZ United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Elizabeth & Georgiana: The Duke of Devonshire and His Two Duchesses (Hardcover)

If you haven't read "Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire," you're likely to come away from "Elizabeth and Georgiana" with a very positive view of Lady Elizabeth Foster. I had read "Georgiana," and I didn't find Bess all that likable, even after reading Chapman's glowing chapters about her life. I did, however, love this book and found it very interesting and well done. There are unanswered questions, though, about Bess and the Duke's children and what the Duchess knew; but, Chapman does a good job of filling us in on what happened to the main characters after Bess's death. Easy to read, filled with information about the Georgian period (for instance, a good explanation of how people traveled in the time), and not so mired in politics of the day as "Georgiana . . ." is.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Eliazbeth & Georgiana, January 23, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: Elizabeth & Georgiana: The Duke of Devonshire and His Two Duchesses (Hardcover)

While I had read about the triangular relationship between Duke and Duchess of Devonshire and Lady Elizabeth Foster, nick-named Bess, I never realized that Bess had such colorful life. The authors use letters and other historical documents to present Bess in a more positive way, than previously recorded. It is a fascinating biography.