Life at the Court of Queen Victoria [Paperback]

Barry St. John Nevill (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 25, 1997

This title looks at Queen Victoria's active life as shown by the collection of personal memorabilia. The author has taken extracts from Victoria's diaries to illustrate the collection, and the title aims to bring warmth and life to our understanding of the Widow of Windsor.

Product Details

• Paperback: 224 pages
• Publisher: Sutton Publishing (May 25, 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0750914815
• ISBN-13: 978-0750914819
• Product Dimensions: 9.7 x 7.5 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,932,218 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Interesting view of a long passed era, May 27, 2004

By 

hola (Texas) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Life at the Court of Queen Victoria (Paperback)

A very excellent book for those interested into the aspects of Queen Victoria's court life. A definite must read. This is a rare jewel of a find.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A delightful Victorian feast, July 28, 2009

By 

P. B. Sharp (NM) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Life at the Court of Queen Victoria (Paperback)

She was a tiny, extraordinarily plain lady, barely five feet tall (although at the end of her life she weighed 170 pounds). She was meddlesome, selfish, but amazingly down-to-earth, sturdy as the Rock of Gibraltar, the symbol of integrity and the heart of the British Empire. She crowned an era with her name. Victoria. There has never been anyone like her and she's irresistible.

This beautifully illustrated journey into Victoria's court will titillate, amuse and fascinate you. Luckily for us, Victoria's Master of the Household- Lord Edward Pelham-Clinton- had kept an incredible scrapbook of the Victorian years and it is this memorabilia that illustrates this remarkable book.

The running narrative for the book is Victoria's own journal, almost seventy years of astute, opinionated observations, the horse's mouth if there ever was one. You'll look over Victoria's shoulder as she writes in her diary- in her frank way- of everything. (The Queen simply could not prevaricate and she said it as she saw it). She didn't like Wagner's face, loathed poor Gladstone but adored Benjamin Disraeli, agonized over the deaths of Prince Eddy and so many others in her family, including two of her own sons. She bemoaned her own physical weaknesses (but without self-pity) as her life drew to a close.

There are marvelous reproductions of beautifully engraved dinner menus, wedding announcements, even train schedules that'll take you right to the scene and make you part of it. The photographs are rare and wonderful: little Beatrice with her long fair hair, the arrogant Kaiser Wilhelm II, Dickens and Robert Browning and Oscar Wilde. There are gorgeous full color reproductions of paintings such as the wedding of Bertie Prince of Wales and of Sir Edwin Landseer sculpting the lions for Trafalgar.Victoria had a charming talent for drawing and you'll see many sketches she did of her own children as well as an interesting one of Lehzen, her old governess.

"Life at the Court of Queen Victoria" is a wonderful potpourri, very, very satisfying to the Queen Victoria buff! Don't miss it!

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Treasure, December 5, 2008

By 

Christina Croft "Christina Croft" (England) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Life at the Court of Queen Victoria (Paperback)

This books is an absolute treasure - filled with all kinds of wonderful details such as the seating plan at Queen Victoria's Jubilee dinner, and lots of beautiful illustrations of menu cards and entertainments. Snippets from the Queen's diaries and wonderful pictures...It's a book to return to again and again. I love it!!

Most Beautiful Princess