Victoria: An Intimate Biography [Hardcover]

Stanley Weintraub (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 30, 1987

Part One Of Two Parts

This complete biography of England's Queen Victoria from the dramatic prelude to her birth in 1819 to her death in the first month of the twentieth century provides new details and illuminates her life as never before. High drama is everywhere. Fatherless at eight months, ignored at first by her royal uncles, kept virtually under house arrest by her mother's confidant, Victoria survived rivals, plots and intimidation. Tragedy and disaster stalked her constantly - deaths of loved ones, rumors of treason, later allegations about a Scottish lover, and near fatal illness. She also escaped seven assassination attempts. Victoria, with all her complexities and stubborn vitality, never leaves the center of her vast stage as she becomes the dominant figure of her time.

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

It has been 25 years since the last major biography of the dumpy little queen who sat on Britain's throne for 64 years, and in view of the mass of scholarly excavating recently done on her, another seems due. Weintraub, noted biographer of Bernard Shaw, Whistler and the Rossettis, fills the need with an intensively researched and highly readable portrait, full of medical and other little-known detail, that brings us much closer to the private Victoria. We see her, above all, in her relations with the key men in her life: her prime ministers, principally Melbourne, Disraeli and Gladstone, the last of whom she detested; her husband Prince Albert, whose premature death sent her into decades of semiseclusion; and her Scottish gillie, Brown, a sort of licensed entertainer and comforter. She was simultaneously selfish and altruistic, passionate and prim, energetic and lazy, a lover of pomp yet middle-class at heartnot so much complex, perhaps, as contradictory. Yet whatever her failings, she was keenly observant and scrupulously honest, which is largely why she cast so powerful a light on her age. Photos not seen by PW.
Copyright 1987 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

It has been more than 20 years since Elizabeth Longford's graceful Queen Victoria: born to succeed (1964). Weintraub makes use of various new tidbits that have come to light in this engaging account, which, like Longford's, is a personal and not a political biography. His version is not strikingly different, making rather less than is sometimes made of Baron Stockmar and John Brown, and perhaps somewhat more of Victoria's difficult temperament and limited perspective. He writes for the general reader; his source notes are very broad and often to secondary sources. Though it will not displace Longford, this lively narrative is a worthy complement to it and, above all, enjoyable to read. Nancy C. Cridland, Indiana Univ. Libs., Bloomington
Copyright 1987 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 700 pages
• Publisher: Dutton Adult; 1st edition (March 30, 1987)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0525244697
• ISBN-13: 978-0525244691
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.1 x 2.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.6 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,172,115 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The queen who gave her name to an era, October 29, 2003

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Joanna Daneman (Middletown, DE USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Victoria: An Intimate Biography (Hardcover)

The term "An Intimate Biography" which is the subtitle of this work by Stanley Weintraub is very accurate. This is the bio of Queen Victoria at home. From the race to the successor of the Enlish throne upon the death of the Princess of Wales, to her reign as an eighteen-year old, her happy marriage and numerous offspring, to the fat and stodgy old Empress who gave her name to an era, this is a view of Victoria we seldom see in history accounts.

The best part of the book is about her marriage to Saxe-Coburg Prince Albert, who was "hired" by Victoria as her consort but found himself in love with the diminutive German-English queen. They exchanged paintings (Victoria loved male nudes and was always smitten by male beauty), they read novels and poetry outloud to each other. Victoria handed over a key to the dispatch boxes wherein lay the documents of State, and the unpopular German prince soon was an invaluable right-hand man and man behind the throne.

Sadly, Prince Albert died (whether from exhaustion after his successful staging of the Crystal Palace exhibition) or from stomach cancer) and Victoria plunged the Throne into interminable mourning. Afterward, her role in the affairs of state, even with important events such as the Sepoy Rebellion and the Boer War, seemed less intense.

The biography focuses on the domestic Victoria, less so on her children, especially the wastrel Edward (Bertie) and strives to keep history as a backdrop to Victoria's life. In this, the biography succeeds admirably, but those interested in English history will want to read other accounts to fill in the events and political intricacies that are only sketched out here.