Up to this point, the majority of the biographies of English monarchs that I have read for my project were written specifically for a series produced by a publisher. The more of these I read, the more I wonder about the selection process that the editors employ in choosing authors for the various volumes. Oftentimes the choice seems an obvious one, as was probably the case of Frank Barlow with Edward the Confessor, or Richard Abels for one about Æthelred. With others, though, the author’s qualifications make their selection a little more puzzling. Were they the best choice, or simply the best one available?
I suspect that the latter might have been the case when Maurice Ashley was commissioned to write a volume on William the Conqueror for Weidenfeld & Nicolson’s “Kings and Queens of England” series. Ashley’s background is a fascinating one: a graduate of Oxford, he worked as a literary assistant for Winston Churchill when the future prime minister wrote his biography of the Duke of Marlborough. This led to a distinguished career as a journalist and editor, during which he wrote a number of histories and biographies. While his credentials as a historian are impeccable, though, his training and focus for most of his career was as a historian of the 17th century. This would make him a natural choice to author a book on Charles I or James II, yet instead he was asked to write a biography of a monarch who reigned seven centuries earlier. It certainly makes for an odd fit between his specialty and the subject.
In some ways, however, it may have been an asset, as free from the lifetime immersion in his subject may have aided Ashley in writing a highly accessible introduction to his subject. Doing so involved familiarizing himself not just with 11th century England but contemporary Normandy as well, and after months spent focused on the Anglo-Saxon world I found it to be a refreshing change of pace. I took a lot from Ashley’s chapter on William’s dukedom, and it certainly sharpened my desire to learn more about it.
Yet Ashley’s focus is understandably on the kingdom Duke William conquered. This he covers in four chapters, providing both a description of his realm and how William asserted his control over it. The most interesting of these chapters was his one on feudalism, as Ashley provides a clear explanation that nonetheless offers a nuanced description of it. Like his chapter on Normandy, it points to another topic that I expect will get more detailed coverage in the other biographies of William awaiting me, and one that I look forward to reading with much anticipation.
Though it may seem as though I found Ashley’s book dissatisfying, it was anything but. His well-illustrated volume does exactly what it sets out to do, which is to provide a comprehensible introduction to William and his era. Whether the foundation he provides is a firm one remains to be seen (though his reliance on Douglas’s book, which is the next stop on my tour through the literature, suggests that it is), but it certainly sets the standard for judging the other books that seek to make William’s world intelligible to the modern reader. I look forward to discovering if any of its counterparts can match it.