The Princes in the Tower Alison Weir Book Review

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The Princes in the Tower: A Review

Alison Weir examines one of England’s oldest murder mysteries in her historical investigation into the deaths of the Edward V and his brother Richard, Duke of York. While most English readers are familiar with the treachery of Richard III thanks to Shakespeare’s play of the same name, Weir throws a magnifying glass over the facts of the case to explore whether the popular legend (that Richard III killed the two young princes) is true after all. The book reads like a spellbinder, supplying the reader with all the background story, clues and details to draw the reader to the conclusion that Richard III was indeed the culprit and that his treachery was what enabled him to soar so quickly to political heights—only to fall just as rapidly under the weight of his own duplicity. As Weir notes, her objective with Princes in the Tower was not to sensationalize the story: she states, “the book was not written with the intention of fueling the controversy, but because there is a need for the subject to be dealt with from an objective viewpoint” (1)—and Weir bases that viewpoint on logic and research.

The synopsis of The Princes in the Tower is that Edward V and his brother Richard, Duke of York, were next in line for the crown in England following the death of Edward IV in 1483. Richard of Gloucester maneuvered to have the princes declared illegitimate by pointing to the pre-contract of marriage that Edward IV had held with Lady Eleanor Butler.

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Richard got Parliament to issue the Titulus Regius which was issued the following year. Meanwhile, Gloucester was crowned as next in line and the suddenly illegitimate princes were whisked away to the Tower and never seen again. The perspective used throughout the book is that of the historian, interested only in the facts. Like a good prosecutor, Weir lays out the character of Richard, establishes a motive, and unspools the circumstances and evidence surrounding the treachery.

The main theme of Weir’s book is that the facts of the case are what matter: fanciful speculation or bias (either for or against Richard) has no place in the book. She describes her sources and lays them before the reader, citing Mancini’s earlier history as a fair and reputable one that should reasonably be considered as legitimate. Weir states that Mancini was “a man of integrity” who “confined himself only to the facts, and avoided falling into the habit affected by so many contemporary writers, that of using historical facts to illustrate a lesson in morality” (2). In other words, Weir sets out to validate the history presented by Mancini. For that reason, the book is full of information surrounding the main characters involved.

The reader should….....

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