Gillian Gill, who holds a PhD in modern French literature from Cambridge University, has taught at Northeastern, Wellesley, Yale, and Harvard. She is the author of Nightingales: The Extraordinary Upbringing and Curious Life of Miss Florence Nightingale, Agatha Christie: The Woman and Her Mysteries, and Mary Baker Eddy. She lives in suburban Boston.
“Gillian Gill has written a superbly accessible account of the
marriage of Queen Victoria and Albert of Saxe-Coburg. She makes us
understand that it was a union constantly pulled between two
contradictory imperatives: the need for the Queen to be supreme
head of state and Albert her subject, and the requirement that the
nineteenth-century wife should be her husband's subordinate in
every way. Gill grippingly recounts the tensions and negotiations
between Victoria and Albert, both in politics and in intimate and
domestic life, as they tried to reconcile this contradiction. She
is particularly good on the couple's later life and their
relationships with their many children. Her book is the story not
just of a marriage and a family but also of the way in which
Victoria appeared to grant Albert precedence but ultimately came to
control the relationship. After Albert's early death Victoria set
about creating an enduring legend of her marriage and inevitably
emerged as both heroine and victor. Gill skillfully shows exactly
how she did it.”—Stella Tillyard, author of A Royal Affair and The
Aristocrats
"Every marriage is a balancing act. In this absorbing book, Gillian
Gill shows how the royal couple counterpoised their partnership—and
their passion—for twenty-one years while bearing the weight of the
world on their shoulders."—Daniel Mark Epstein, author of The
Lincolns: Portrait of a Marriage
"Gillian Gill’s double biography, We Two, is intimate and
delicious. Gill has a gift for finding the telling details which
bring the royal couple to life, and she has created a fascinating
study of a woman negotiating her supreme power in a male-dominated
society and a traditional marriage. The push and pull between
Albert, who is a complicated mixture of rigidity and softness, and
Victoria, reluctant mother of nine and natural sovereign, makes a
great story.”—Susan Quinn, author of Marie Curie: A Life
“This is a more compassionate look into the lives of Victoria and
Albert, in which they become people to whom we can relate––the
stuffed shirts get sent to the laundry and a much softer fabric is
returned!”—Anne Perry, author of the series of Victorian
mysteries
“Gill’ s spirited reconstruction of Queen Victoria’s three-act
drama of a life—as teen-age ruler, partner to her ambitious consort
Prince Albert, and queen in her own right after his death—enjoins
us to rethink the meaning of the word “Victorian,” too long a
synonym for moral stuffiness. Perhaps now, with Gill’s timely book,
we can revalue this much-maligned term to let it reflect Victoria’s
courage in managing her long reign at a time when there were few
opportunities for women of any rank, let alone for royals. A
thought-provoking look at an era starting to grapple with issues
that shed light on recent history.”—Carolyn Burke, author of Lee
Miller, A Life
“What a whale of a wonderful read this is! Queen Victoria and
Prince Albert jump forward from these pages in all their full,
complex humanity—she, the besotted, emotional wife; and he, the
reserved, cool, moralizing spouse. We Two shares a passionate,
often frustrating relationship, one fraught with unconscious
rivalries. Gillian Gill tells us the full story of a royal marriage
that was to have profound effects upon European history—and she
does so in a compelling, thoroughly engrossing way.”—Maggie Scarf,
author of September Songs
According to Gill (Nightingales), the age that has been labeled Victorian was, in its origins, Albertian. Prince Albert was the chaste scion of a family of ambitious, debt-ridden, sexually corrupt misogynists, and his holy war of moral strictness made him appear straitlaced, judgmental and sanctimonious. In marrying Victoria, says Gill, Albert planned to take the reins of British power, though parliamentary rules didn't allow him to be king. Gill paints a portrait of this marriage as a "work in progress," in which the balance of power shifted continually between queen and consort, but Victoria's repeated pregnancies caused a dramatic shift in Albert's favor: he joined her meetings with ministers, and met or corresponded with the most powerful men in England and abroad. His great accomplishment was keeping Great Britain out of the American Civil War; he also served a stint as chancellor of Cambridge, bringing the university into the modern world. Despite their constant battle for dominance, Victoria was always madly in love while Albert was pleased to be adored. A lively, perceptive, impressively researched biography of what Gill terms "a forerunner of today's power couple." 16 pages of color illus.; b&w illus. throughout. (May 19) Copyright 2009 Reed Business Information.
"Gillian Gill has written a superbly accessible account of the
marriage of Queen Victoria and Albert of Saxe-Coburg. She makes us
understand that it was a union constantly pulled between two
contradictory imperatives: the need for the Queen to be supreme
head of state and Albert her subject, and the requirement that the
nineteenth-century wife should be her husband's subordinate in
every way. Gill grippingly recounts the tensions and negotiations
between Victoria and Albert, both in politics and in intimate and
domestic life, as they tried to reconcile this contradiction. She
is particularly good on the couple's later life and their
relationships with their many children. Her book is the story not
just of a marriage and a family but also of the way in which
Victoria appeared to grant Albert precedence but ultimately came to
control the relationship. After Albert's early death Victoria set
about creating an enduring legend of her marriage and inevitably
emerged as both heroine and victor. Gill skillfully shows exactly
how she did it."-Stella Tillyard, author of A Royal
Affair and The Aristocrats
"Every marriage is a balancing act. In this absorbing book, Gillian
Gill shows how the royal couple counterpoised their partnership-and
their passion-for twenty-one years while bearing the weight of the
world on their shoulders."-Daniel Mark Epstein, author of The
Lincolns: Portrait of a Marriage
"Gillian Gill's double biography, We Two, is intimate and
delicious. Gill has a gift for finding the telling details which
bring the royal couple to life, and she has created a fascinating
study of a woman negotiating her supreme power in a male-dominated
society and a traditional marriage. The push and pull between
Albert, who is a complicated mixture of rigidity and softness, and
Victoria, reluctant mother of nine and natural sovereign, makes a
great story."-Susan Quinn, author of Marie Curie: A Life
"This is a more compassionate look into the lives of Victoria and
Albert, in which they become people to whom we can relate--the
stuffed shirts get sent to the laundry and a much softer fabric is
returned!"-Anne Perry, author of the series of Victorian
mysteries
"Gill' s spirited reconstruction of Queen Victoria's three-act
drama of a life-as teen-age ruler, partner to her ambitious consort
Prince Albert, and queen in her own right after his death-enjoins
us to rethink the meaning of the word "Victorian," too long a
synonym for moral stuffiness. Perhaps now, with Gill's timely book,
we can revalue this much-maligned term to let it reflect Victoria's
courage in managing her long reign at a time when there were few
opportunities for women of any rank, let alone for royals. A
thought-provoking look at an era starting to grapple with issues
that shed light on recent history."-Carolyn Burke, author of
Lee Miller, A Life
"What a whale of a wonderful read this is! Queen Victoria and
Prince Albert jump forward from these pages in all their full,
complex humanity-she, the besotted, emotional wife; and he, the
reserved, cool, moralizing spouse. We Two shares a passionate,
often frustrating relationship, one fraught with unconscious
rivalries. Gillian Gill tells us the full story of a royal marriage
that was to have profound effects upon European history-and she
does so in a compelling, thoroughly engrossing way."-Maggie
Scarf, author of September Songs
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