The Sun King: Louis XIV at Versailles (New York Review Books (Paperback)) - Softcover

Mitford, Nancy

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1590174917 ISBN 13: 9781590174913

Publisher: New York Review of Books, 2012

Synopsis

Rare Book

About this title

Review:

"Irreverently lifts the skirts of the dolls of Versailles and rummages about underneath, exposing one gem of irresistible detail after another. . . . A glorious tribute to a glorious age." -- The Irish Times

"[Mitford's] interest is focused on the human beings whose hopes, frustrations, and tragedies are hidden behind the stiff brocade of the period. The splendid century had its seamy side, and her racy narrative alternates between the glory and the grime, the ermine and the vermin." -- The New York Times

"History, like the kingdom of heaven, has many mansions, Nancy Mitford's being, I suggest, a ravishingly pretty one, where anyone would be happy to spend time--and many have." -- Antonia Fraser

"Nancy Mitford excels in depicting both the brilliant romantic showcase and the recessed world of power. . . . No historian writing in English has given a better pen-picture of Versailles in its heyday." --Time

"A brilliant son et lumière performance." --Guardian

"Nancy Mitford was particularly well-equipped to write about Louis XIV: She spent much of her adult life in France and possessed a sharp eye for detail." -- Washington Post Book World

"Nancy Mitford gives vivid, indeed searching, portraits of the Grand Monarch, and of his awe-struck relations and courtiers . . . she summarizes a wealth of information about the king's long, eventful life at Versailles . . . Readers will wish that her book were twice as long." -- Sunday Times (London)

About the Author:

Nancy Mitford (1904-1973) was born into the British aristocracy and, by her own account, brought up without an education, except in riding and French. She managed a London bookshop during the Second World War, then moved to Paris, where she began to write her celebrated and successful novels, among them The Pursuit of Love and Love in a Cold Climate, about the foibles of the English upper class. Nancy Mitford was also the author of four biographies: Madame de Pompadour (1954; available as an NYRB Classic), Voltaire in Love (1957), The Sun King (1966), and Frederick the Great (1970). In 1967 Mitford moved from Paris to Versailles, where she lived until her death from Hodgkin's disease.

Philip Mansel is the author of six books dealing with French history, including a life of Louis XVIII (1981), The Court of France, 1789-1830 (1989) and Paris Between Empires (2001). He is currently at work on a life of Louis XIV.

About this edition

• Publisher: New York Review of Books
• Publication date: 2012
• ISBN 10: 1590174917
• ISBN 13: 9781590174913
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 272