Welcome to British Isles Friday! British Isles Friday is a weekly event for sharing all things British and Irish - reviews, photos, opinions, trip reports, guides, links, resources, personal stories, interviews, and research posts. Join us each Friday to link your British and Irish themed content and to see what others have to share. The link list is at the bottom of this post. Pour a cup of tea or lift a pint and join our link party!
Last week, I reviewed the Ever After High series of YA novels. Gaele reviewed A Year of New Adventures (about a woman who starts a business running writer retreats) and Where the Wild Cherries Grow (set in 1969 London and in an English village in 1919). Becky reviewed Jane Austen at Home (I promise we didn't coordinate our interest in this book) and Kings and Queens of Britain with a mnemonic poem for remembering the monarchs in order. Sim went to Hyde Park and Kensington Gardens and found parakeets!
Lucy Worsley has been called a national treasure of England. Her actual title is Chief Curator at Historic Royal Palaces but she's best known as the engaging host of historical documentaries on BBC and for authoring related books. Her delight is infectious.
She's famous for dressing the part. Sometimes, when it's particularly cogent, she even cross-dresses. There's a really amusing scene in Elegance and Decadence: The Age of the Regency when she learns to dress like Beau Brummell. She apparently attends events in costume, too. Here, she's portraying a suffragette at an event hosted by the Mayor of London:
I'm proud to unveil the 59 individuals who will appear around the plinth of Gillian Wearing's Millicent Fawcett statue in honour of their role in securing women's suffrage. Thank you @Lucy_Worsley for teaching us more about them #BehindEveryGreatCity https://t.co/4bxtIB1NqJ pic.twitter.com/hFOV3OxHi2
- Mayor of London (@MayorofLondon) February 6, 2018
Fortunately, her public work is becoming more widely available in the US. From local libraries, I can get a handful of books and three of her newer series that were distributed by PBS. Most of my exposure to her work, however, has been from what I fear are pirated videos on YouTube.
I'm currently doing some research to write about a fictional woman's experience in 1812, so I enjoyed skimming the book Jane Austen at Home and watching the series Jane Austen: Behind Closed Doors.
Have you watched or read anything by Lucy Worsley?
About Joy Weese Moll
a librarian writing about books
