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Mary, Queen of Scots

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the history of Mary Stuart, Queen of Scots, who might have united the French, English and Scottish thrones.

In a programme first broadcast in 2017, Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the history of Mary, Queen of Scots, who had potential to be one of the most powerful rulers in Europe, yet she was also one of the most vulnerable. In France, when she was the teenage bride to their future king, she was seen as rightful heir to the thrones of England and Ireland, as well as Queen of Scotland and one day of France, which would have been an extraordinary union. She was widowed too young, though and, a Catholic returning to Protestant Scotland, she struggled to overcome rivalries in her own country. She fled to Protestant England, where she was implicated in plots to overthrow Elizabeth, and it was Elizabeth herself who signed Mary's death warrant.

With

David Forsyth
Principal Curator, Scottish Medieval-Early Modern Collections at National Museums Scotland

Anna Groundwater
Teaching Fellow in Historical Skills and Methods at the University of Edinburgh

And

John Guy
Fellow of Clare College, University of Cambridge

Producer: Simon Tillotson.

Available now

52 minutes

Last on

Thu 2 Jul 2020 21:30
BBC Radio 4

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LINKS AND FURTHER READING

David Forsyth, Principal Curator, Scottish Medieval-Early Modern Collections at National Museums Scotland

Anna Groundwater, Teaching Fellow in Historical Skills and Methods at the University of Edinburgh

John Guy, Fellow of Clare College, University of Cambridge

Mary, Queen of Scots – Oxford Dictionary of National Biography

Mary, Queen of Scots – Wikipedia

 

READING LIST:

Ian B. Cowan, The Enigma of Mary Stuart (Sphere, 1972)

Jane E. A. Dawson, Scotland Re-formed: 1488-1587 (Edinburgh University Press, 2007)

Gordon Donaldson, All the Queen’s Men: Power and Politics in Mary Stewart’s Scotland (Batsford Press, 1983)

Susan Doran, Mary Queen of Scots: An Illustrated Life (British Library Publishing Division, 2007)

Antonia Fraser, Mary, Queen of Scots (first published 1969; Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2009)

John Guy, My Heart is My Own: The Life of Mary Queen of Scots (Harper Perennial, 2004)

Rosalind K. Marshall, Queen of Scots (Mercat Press, 2000)

Alison Weir, Mary Queen of Scots and the Murder of Lord Darnley (Vintage, 2008)

Jenny Wormald, Mary Queen of Scots: A Study in Failure with a new foreword and afterward by Anna Groundwater (Birlinn, forthcoming June 2017)

Jenny Wormald, Mary, Queen of Scots: Politics, Passion and a Kingdom Lost (first published 1990; Tauris Parke, 2001)

Credits

Presenter Melvyn Bragg
Interviewed Guest David Forsyth
Interviewed Guest Anna Groundwater
Interviewed Guest John Guy
Producer Simon Tillotson

Broadcasts

  • Thu 19 Jan 2017 09:00
    BBC Radio 4 FM
  • Thu 19 Jan 2017 21:30
    BBC Radio 4
  • Thu 2 Jul 2020 09:00
    BBC Radio 4
  • Thu 2 Jul 2020 21:30
    BBC Radio 4

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