When Women Ruled the World, Maureen Quilligan
When Women Ruled the World, Maureen Quilligan
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When Women Ruled the World
Making the Renaissance in Europe

Author: Maureen Quilligan

Narrator: Suzanne Toren

Unabridged: 9 hr 27 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 10/12/2021


Synopsis

A leading Renaissance scholar shows in this revisionist history how four powerful women redefined the culture of European monarchy in the glorious sixteenth century.

Library Journal, "Books and Authors to Know: Titles to Watch 2021"

Sixteenth-century Europe was a time of destabilization of age-old norms and the waging of religious wars—yet it also witnessed the remarkable flowering of a pacific culture cultivated by a cohort of extraordinary women rulers who sat on Europe's thrones, most notably Mary Tudor; Elizabeth I; Mary, Queen of Scots; and Catherine de' Medici.

Recasting the dramatic stories and complex political relationships among these four women rulers, Maureen Quilligan rewrites centuries of scholarship that sought to depict intense personal hatreds among them. Instead, showing how the queens engendered a culture of mutual respect, When Women Ruled the World focuses on the gift-giving by which they aimed to ensure female bonds of friendship and alliance. Detailing the artistic and political creativity that flourished in the pockets of peace created by these queens, this book offers a new perspective on the glory of the Renaissance and the women who helped to create it.

About Maureen Quilligan

Maureen Quilligan is R. Florence Brinkley Professor of English Emerita at Duke University. The author of books about medieval and Renaissance literature, she was also coeditor of the groundbreaking essay collection Rewriting the Renaissance: The Discourses of Sexual Difference in Early Modern Europe.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Ana

2.75 stars *may change that’s so crazy i cant believe queen elizabeth was alive in the 1500s… you learn something new every day......more

Goodreads review by Lois

This was largely boring. The main focus was gift giving and it just truly draggggggggggggged.......more

Recorded history is often dominated by men. Particularly Western History. But there are times, often pivotal times in Western History where women, not men, are the primary movers and shakers of the age. This book takes a look at one such time -- the 1500s and four rulers who were rulers in their own......more

Goodreads review by Lisa

2.5 stars rounded up to 3 because the author spent five pages talking about Spenser 🥰......more