|
|
|
Daughter of York re-visits many of the characters from "A Rose for the Crown," as we follow Margaret, sister of Edward IV and Richard III, from the court of England where, as a pawn in Edward's political schemes, she is kept single until she is 22, when a Burgundian alliance is forged through her marriage to Charles the Bold, the new Duke of Burgundy.
Despite fulfilling her duty to her new country with intelligence and aplomb, Margaret never forgets she is an English princess and a daughter of the House of York. Her homesickness is exacerbated by having to leave behind the love of her life. Fate brings them together rarely after she becomes duchess to a man she only met a week before her marriage, and whom she discovers suffers from such a grandiose view of his place in history that he is capable of great cruelty towards anyone who stands in his way. He also prefers spending time on a battlefield than at home with his wife. She finds solace in the bond she forges with her new young stepdaughter, her friendship with William Caxton, learning to rule her new country, and her unusual confidante, a dwarf named Fortunata. But once in a while, she breaks the rules in the arms of her one true love... |
  argaret is a woman of her time, but she might also be a woman of ours. Had she been born a man in England in the time of the Wars of the Roses, she would have made a memorable king.
In 2005, the town of Mechelen in Belgium, where Margaret spent many of her later years, honored her and one of Charles the Bold's granddaughters, another Margaret, in a six-month exhibition acknowledging the role of these two indomitable women born in the 15th century and rulers of Burgundy. The town of Bruges still celebrates Margaret's wedding parade every five years, as the Pageant of the Golden Tree.
|
