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Mary Queen of Scots and the Murder of Lord Darnley

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Alison Weir's "Mary Queen of Scots and the Murder of Lord Darnley" is not the best of her popular histories, but it is still a well-written, copiously researched piece that despite its length goes along at a brisk pace. Weir defends her decision to write a detailed set-up to the murder of Darnley from the outset, and does so in great detail, most of it truly pertinent to the case.

However, what it comes down to -- as it so often does with Mary -- is the question of the Casket Letters. Weir discounts their authenticity vehemently and exonorates Mary of any complicity in her husband's death. This begs the big issue of Mary's character as a ruthless schemer, brought up in Machiavellian France, losing her head over plots against Elizabeth. Weir makes a case here, but does not convince nor provide new interpretations of old evidence.

If you are a Marian, this book will add ample fuel to your fire. If you are not, the last sentence will make you gasp in righteous indignation.

This is not an introductory-level book. I would only recommend it for those who already have a reasonably good knowledge of the period. The book more-or-less assumes that you are already familiar with the issues surrounding the succession to the English throne in the 16th century, that you already know the royal family trees, that you understand something of the Catholic-Protestant conflicts of the time, that you know who William Cecil and Robert Dudley were, etc. It's not light reading, and it focuses in depth on only one specific issue.

The general impression of Scottish politics at this time is of dozens of ruthless, power-seeking noblemen all changing sides, lying, scheming, and double-crossing each other at a rapid rate. The numerous documents relating to Darnley's murder (of which the Casket Letters are only a small, though vital, part) are almost all filled with contradictions, inconsistencies, blatant omissions, deliberate distortions, and attempts to blame or clear specific individuals; and are closely tied to political, religious or financial interests. To try to find the truth in this whole mess is like cleaning the Augean stables. Weir has done about as good a job as anyone could, in analyzing everything logically and looking at it in the light of common sense. I think that this book makes a real contribution to the topic.

Weir says about her conclusion, "Even after extensive research, I believed, as I began to write this book, that Mary was guilty. But when I came to analyse the source material in depth, it became increasingly obvious that such a conclusion was not possible." She makes a good, clear, well-reasoned, consistent case, always referring back to the original sources and weighing them carefully.

Mary comes across as politically naive and prone to major errors of judgment. On many occasions she was also physically very ill and mentally close to a nervous breakdown. She was often at the mercy of the 'wolf-like earls' surrounding her, but it must also be said that she tried (unsuccessfully) to play a double game on various occasions, saying one thing to one person and the opposite to someone else.

I have to say that, even though the book is well written, I didn't find it all that enjoyable. There wasn't a single person in it that I could really identify with or sympathize with - not even Mary. I think that this is not so much a reflection on the author, as on the unappealing people and circumstances she has chosen to write about. I've thoroughly enjoyed several of Alison Weir's other books and the writing and scholarship here is up to the same high standard. It's just that the subject matter is a bit dull.

I found myself not really caring whether Morton was lying to Maitland, or whether Moray was manipulating Mar and Morton, or whether Maitland was trying to betray Mary and Moray, or whether it was all the other way round this particular month. After chapters of this kind of thing, it became a bit much. Like the Earl of Sussex, I was disgusted by "the inconstancy and subtleness of the people with whom we deal."

Darnley himself was an extremely unpleasant character - arrogant, spoiled, stupid, self-centered, superficial, devious, and untrustworthy - and his death left most people cold. Elizabeth I, Darnley's relative, wrote to Mary after his murder, "I cannot conceal that I grieve more for you than for him."

Unless you have some special interest in the issue of Darnley's murder, I would recommend that you rather try 'The Life of Elizabeth I' or 'Henry VIII, the King and his Court', or one of the other excellent books by Weir.

Mary, Queen of Scots and the Murder of Lord Darnley by Alison Weir is exactly what the title promises. That should not be a surprise but, as the book is almost six hundred pages long, it is a bit suprising. I was expecting much more tangential information to fill out the story but the author has kept the focus sharp and drives the narrative forward in a clean straight line. This is everything one will ever need to know about the murder of Lord Darnley and in that respect the book is entertaining, informative and will be a wonderful addition for all Alison Weir fans. The only caveat is that the book could have used a little more editing in spots, particularly where the author drives home her points repeatedly. This is not the best Tudor-period history book that Alison Weir has written , of which there are many and all are recommended highly, but is still much better than most out there.

I found this a very boring, tedious book and could not slog through it to the end. Ms. Weir embarks on a mission to "prove" Mary innocent of Darnley's death. I don't think anyone has ever suggested that she physically took part in the crime, but Ms Weir fails to make the case that she lacked complicity in the affair. I simply do not believe that Mary, brought up in the dissolute court of Henry II of France, was as naive as Ms Weir implies. Furthermore, Mary's later passion for, and complicity in, an extensive series of failed plots against Elizabeth of England belies this stand. The guilt or innocence of the Darnley plot rests-as it always seems to- on the evidence provided by the Casket Letters. About halfway through this discussion is where I gave up. Ms. Weir makes a case here, but neither convinces nor provides new interpretations of old, existing evidence. Finally, I have enjoyed tremendously every other one of Ms. Weir's Tudor biographies- she should stick with those rather than attempt a "scholarly" defense.

The subjects of Alison Weir's most recent effort, Mary Stewart and her murdered husband Henry Darnley, remain fascinatingly dichotomous: they both had repulsive character flaws and yet were privileged, unusually attractive, and played central roles during a pivotal time in 16th C. Scottish history.

Weir, unfortunately, isn't capable of an objective analysis of her meticulously researched material. She can't keep Mary at an emotional arm's length and this inability has completely undermined Weir's credibility, transforming her tome into a confusing brief by a sychophantic advocate.

Mary, though promoted for centuries as a tragic figure and a victim of her unruly nobles, was so unsuited to her royal position that her hapless life/death were utterly predictable. Not only was she extremely unintelligent and shallow, but she lacked even nominal skills at statescraft. Her queenship was a disaster and her personal life was a mess. But Weir won't let Mary take any of the blame. Oh no, not Mary. Lest you forget, she was a victim of all those bad men and uncontrollable circumstances. Poor lamb.

Darnley, whom Mary so desperately wanted because he was tall, beautiful and had great legs, turned out to be one of the most obnoxious consorts of all time - so awful that he has become a caricature of vanity, duplicity and greed. Mary, who wasn't much better, had to get rid of him and, rather like Henry II's stated desire to rid himself of the turbulent Becket, she apparently set Darnley's murder at Kirk 'o Fields into motion.

But Weir, while reluctantly acknowledging Mary's motive and the substantial evidence pointing to her involvment in the plot, has zealously offered the "it wasn't me, it was that guy over there" defense. And it just doesn't work.

Weir, in fact, deforms the evidence indicting Mary in such a ham-handed fashion that this reader repeatedly put the book down in disgust, only to pick it back up to see just how far Weir was willing to go. And it is farther than any legitimate biographer or historian can - or should - go.

This proves to be a pretty interesting book. Alison Weir make an excellent case in stating that Mary, Queen of Scots was not involved in murder of her husband. Her condemnation of the Casket letters appears to be the center point of her case. Since these letters damned Mary, they must be forgeries or else the whole book is meaningless. I am sure that there will be many historians out there who will not agreed with Weir's interpetation and perception but her reasoning appears to be quite fair. Weir does a good job in portarying Mary as an immature, over stressed, under educated and extremely incompetence ruler but not a murderess. Her actions at times were so illogical that it really do defied common sense. Alison Weir does some excellent research and I would considered this to be an excellent supplemental work along with Antonia Fraser's Mary, Queen of Scots book. And its excellent reading material all the way.

Alison Weir writes wonderfully. Her discussion is crisp, engaging, and even by turns charming. She has a knack for pulling out telling detail, and weaves original source material deftly through each passage. In introducing Lord Darnley, the then-future husband of Mary, Queen of Scots, she notes that his parents doted on him, holding him particularly precious as most of his siblings died in infancy. She finds a letter he wrote at 8 that sheds insight on his ambition and religion. Detail by detail, she paints his personality, bringing him to life before us. This is a book that is hard to put down.

Yet, Weir also has a knack for building assumption on frail assumption, trying to build a house of bricks on a foundation of straw. As an example, she speculates that the illness that plagued Darnley in the months before his death was not smallpox (as commonly assumed) but rather an intermediate stage of syphilis. She acknowledges that this is not clear from the record, but merely speculation, and outlines both the pros and cons for her view. Weir is clear enough: there's some reasonable chance she is right, but she acknowledges that, across the years, it is impossible to establish her position with certainty. Weir then builds on this assumption, suggesting it was "inconceivable" that Mary did not find out that syphilis ailed her husband, making assumptions about Mary's state of mind, whether or not she may have had another pregnancy, and how she interacted with other men and her husband based on the speculations about Darnley's disease. This is but one example. Again and again, as one works through the book, speculations which are carefully qualified and limited on first argument become certainties when repeated a few pages later, so that as one finally reaches her conclusion, gets her point, and steps back to consider whether she is right, her logic simply melts away. In the end, she adds nothing to the history but her pretty words.

Had this been a work of historical fiction, I would praise it. Weir is a wonderful story teller. Alas, the book masquerades as history. But, oh, if only other historians could write like Weir!

This book took some time to get through. First of all, its quite long- almost 600 pages- and second, the material is a bit difficult to take in all at once. Here, Alison Weir takes a look at the murder of Lord Darnley, king consort to Mary, Queen of Scots. Its an interesting take on a mystery that has intrigued many scholars and non-scholars alike, though I'm afraid that Weir does not present any new evidence in this book.

In the first few chapters, Weir quickly skims over Mary's parentage, birth, childhood, and marriage to Louis of France. Like most nobles of the period, Mary's first language was French, her second the native Scots; she did not learn English until she was 26 years old. Weir goes into deeper detail over Lord Darnley (birth name Henry Lennox), to get a picture of the kind of man Mary married. Lord Darnley was not a popular person, first for his personality and second for what he aspired to (i.e., being king of Scotland in his own right, a privilege Mary luckily never gave him). Within a few months of their marriage, the relationship soured, Mary quickly learned what kind of person Darnley really was. Weir also poses a theory which she never quite develops: that Darnley may have been gay. Weir's evidence is circumstantial: that he slept in the same bed as court advisor Rizzio, and also that Darnley was somewhat effeminate in appearance. At any rate, Weir never follows up this theory conclusively.

Rizzio, an Italian Jew, also is an interesting character. In some ways, Rizzio is a kind of Italian Rasputin, entering into the graces of the queen, exerting control over her, and in 1566 murdered by other nobles at court. Darnley was implicated by the conspirators as the main propellant behind the murder, though this has been disproved. Mary's relationship to Rizzio has been widely speculated upon. Was Mary's child (the future King James I of England) Rizzio's? Weir says without a doubt no, and I tend to believe her. There is absolutely no proof whatsoever that Mary and Rizzio were having an affair and Weir does right in not probing the issue any further than she has to.

What will intrigue the reader the most is the actual plot, and subsequent murder, of Lord Darnley. I am inclined to believe that the same people who were involved in the murder of Rizzio were involved in Darnley's murder in February, 1568. The Casket Letters, which Weir gives to the reader in exerpts, are rather sketchy as evidence, since they may as well have been forged by the people who plotted Darnley's downfall.

The murder, which took place in the form of an explosion at Kirk o'Fields, is documented in a Prologue. However, Weir took so long setting up the murder that it seems rather anticlimactic at the end. Lord Darnley is depicted as such an unlikable person that the reader finds himself thinking, "so what? Maybe he deserved to die." I also don't believe in Weir's conclusion- that Mary was the most wronged woman in history, or that all the blame was placed upon her. I certainly believe that Mary had many reasons for why she wanted her husband dead, not the least of which because she two months before she had been unable to procure a divorce or anullment for herself. I also believe that the people who wanted Dranley dead took advantage of this fact in order to set her up. Yet no one in this whole scenario is "innocent" as such, and I think it was presumptuous for Weir to display Mary as a woman who was targeted needlessly.

In all this is a well-written book by a respected English historian, though it lacks in some areas. However, Weir documented her sources well and for the most part is able to back up her claims- which is of course what matters, from a historian's point of view. It's a good book for people who want background material on Lord Darnley's murder, but not all that good for someone who is already schooled in the subject.

We own all of the books published--so far--by Alison Weir except the one on genealogy. All of the others are more interesting. The problem of this book, really, is because the author sticks so closely to the subject indicated in the title: Mary Queen of Scots and the MURDER of Lord Darnley. That is a very narrow subject to cover in so many pages, and it becomes too detailed and repetitive. I have really enjoyed all of her other books that I have read.

At the close of the book, author Alison Weir puts the matter in straightforward terms (Page 577): "Her [Mary's] tragedy was that she was in many respects innately unsuited for the role to which she had been born. Compared with her cousin Elizabeth, she was a political; innocent, and as such she was thrust into a situation in which a seasoned, hard-headed male ruler might have floundered." And, indeed, the juxtaposition between Elizabeth and Mary is warranted.

This book, ostensibly, focuses on who murdered Mary's second husband, Lord Darnley. He was not a very likeable or admirable person, and many would profit by his death. But to get to the murder of Darnley and its aftermath, the book begins at the start of the story, Mary's early life and her move to serve as Queen of Scots.

Word of warning: Keep pages 670-673 dog-eared. There are two charts, outlining the relationships among key players in the history of Mary--from Kings of England Henry VII and Henry VIII, the Scots House of Stewart, the Lennoxes and Hamiltons. Many of the major figures in this work are included in the genealogies.

Mary was married to the Dauphin of France when young; he dies relatively soon after becoming King. In her life, given her family background, she had a claim as Queen of France, Queen of Scots, and Queen of England. Unfortunately, she kept pressing (and scheming) to become Queen of England. In the end, her royal cousin's patience ended and Mary's life ended, too.

The work described Mary's life upon her return to Scotland (since she had been in France for so long, French was her natural language). Given her royal blood, there were many ideas as to whom she should marry. One key advisor, Maitland, wanted closer relations with England and, hence, preferred someone who could make that happen. Others preferred foreign mates. In the end, she chose Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley, of the Lennox family. Indeed, he was related to Mary. However, it rapidly became obvious that Darnley was not very admirable. He was dissolute and a constant worry to Mary. They separated on a number of occasions. She was concerned that, even though he was the father to her child (who became King James I after Elizabeth's death), he also threatened her reign.

The book well described the dizzying array of shifting coalitions. People went from champions of Mary to scheming to kill one of her advisors to scheming to kill Darnley to scheming to overthrow her and, to complicate matters, scheming to return her to the throne. Needless to say, someone as unprepared for ruling as Mary was often out of her depth.

The author does a nice job of identifying the circumstances of Darnley's death. Some have claimed that Mary was involved. Others have specified other suspects. Weir's case is pretty convincing to me (don't expect a spoiler in this review!). After Darnley's death, Mary made another terrible choice of a spouse and was ultimately dethroned. The book then chronicles her flight from the rebels and her virtual imprisonment for two decades in England.

There were some positive hallmarks of her reign. For the time she (a Catholic) was remarkably tolerant. But in an era of religious intolerance, she was looked askance at by both Protestants and Catholics.

All in all, a very well detailed and generally well written biography of Mary Queen of Scots and her star-crossed relationship with Darnley. If interested in the history and players of this era, this is a good resource.