European Royalty discussion

Discuss Archduchess: Chapters 11-19 and Heiress: Chapters 20-23 here.

Some more modern thinking that bothered me was Juana wondering about women's rights in France: "Was there some ancient custom in France that prohibited a woman from entering the king's presence without prior leave? It wouldn't surprise me: France was one of the few kingdoms that still barred female succession." Once again, I just don't think people would have thought like this back then. It's not like there were a bunch of women all over the other thrones of Europe, and even if women could take the throne in other countries (like England) that didn't stop the kings from desperately trying to get sons to take over for them even when they had daughters (like Henry VIII).

Juana still seems completely coherent and thoughtful to me (I haven't finished this section, so that could change) which is still throwing me off. I really want to read a non-fiction book about her - maybe any mental illness she had came up late in life. I keep waiting for something to be a sign of mental illness, but since it's from Juana's point of view, it's really difficult. I thought the part where Juana thought that Anne of Brittany deliberately insulted her just seemed silly since the poor woman had a bad leg. My first thought was, is the author really serious with this? Then I thought, well, maybe this is the beginning of Juana's mental illness that's making her see slights where none are meant - some form of paranoia? I just don't know. I don't think the author would be so subtle based on what I've read so far.

You will start seeing some references to madness in this section, but only from other people. I think the point the author's trying to make is that the claims of her madness were exterior and then she chose to use them to her benefit in her race for the crown. At least, that's where I think it's going... but we shall see. Maybe she'll really lose it later. :)

I finally finished this section, and after reading your other post Emily, I finally get what's going on! I didn't expect the author to take a twist on whether she was mentally ill or not, so it was driving me crazy (excuse the pun) trying to figure out when it was going to come up.

The whole thing is kind of confusing to me in some ways. I actually enjoyed the beginning of the book in that it took time to develop relationship between the characters and such. Around this point of the point, it seems to get a bit more frenetic and I have trouble really knowing what to believe. I'm going to have to do some historical back-reading, I think, to really appreciate this book. Anyone have any suggestions?

The non-fiction book I'm going to try to find is Juana the Mad: Sovereignty and Dynasty in Renaissance Europe by Bethany Aram. If you can find it, a good fiction book I read (multiple times) was Daughters of Spain by Jean Plaidy. All of her books are really well researched. That book is part of an Isabella and Ferdinand trilogy which is just wonderful (the first book, Castile for Isabella, gets into how Isabella's mother was mentally ill, so when Juana comes around and acts a little funny, Isabella is afraid it has been passed on). Wikipedia's entry on her seems pretty good as well.

Besides waiting for Juana to go crazy, I did enjoy the beginning of the book as well, especially the parts in Spain. I can even admire the woman the author is trying to create - free-spirited and strong as opposed to mentally ill. But I agree that things got frentic and really melodramatic towards the end of these two sections. The writing just seemed rough and a little awkward and almost comical: "Your Highness has lost all reason. This behavior, it - it is madness." "Guards! Take her. Lock her in her rooms. She is insane!" "You must be mad to say such things." These lines just seemed forced, like the author felt he had to work in the words "mad" and "insane" so we would know that's what other people were thinking. And Juana's responses and thoughts to these phrases weren't much better: "In truth, I was mad. Mad with sorrow and the pain of betrayal. Mad with rage and grief and fear." "Yes, I must be mad. Mad to have ever loved you, to have thought you had a shred of honor in that treacherous Habsburg body of yours. Mad to have believed all the lies you told me, over and over again. Mad to have ever thought you could love anyone but yourself." "I was not the one who was mad here. He was. Mad with power and his own overwhelming self-importance." Ugghh, I wanted the mental illness to come up, but not like this with people just declaring her insane or mad! Using those words doesn't make it so!

I know what eventually happened to Juana historically, and I don't want to say anything here to ruin the ending of the book, but with her being sane (at least so far) and hating Philip so much, I just don't see how the book can end like historians believe things ended. I'll have to elaborate more in the next thread once I get there.

I'll definitely have to check those out - I knew I could count on you for a recommendation! :)

I am in total agreement with you about how forced a lot of the language seemed regarding the insanity. I was like, yes, thank you, I get it.

Ha ha, I know - how many times did they have to declare her mad and insane? I agree with you Emily - I got it the first time!

Oh, and Leah ordered the Juana the Mad book from Amazon and said she would let me know how it is, so if she doesn't post it here, I'll pass that information along. I probably will try to see if my library has it.

I agree with your feelings. I think that the modern day thinking is what is bothering me all through this book. I am now in the last section, Queen and find it very distracting. The whole breastfeeding situation with Juana was very hard to believe, even as fiction, as I don't think that she would have even thought of breastfeeding on her own.

Lalatina, I agree with your thought about the breast feeding - I don't think she would have thought to do it either. There also was a part where she talked about going to the market and shopping or haggling like a fishwife (or something like that), which seemed a little far fetched to me as well - as if the "simple life" was so much more enjoyable then the pampered life of royalty. I wonder if the author was trying to give Juana thoughts and feelings that he thought a modern reader could relate to. Thing is (if that was the case), I don't really think the modern reader would have much of anything in common with 16th century royalty - that's the whole reason I like to read about them (it's a whole different world)! I'd read more modern day fiction if I wanted a character to really relate to me and issues I go through.