Sex with Kings: 500 Years of Adultery, Power, Rivalry, and Revenge (P.S.)
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List Price: $13.95 $11.86 $ 2.09 ( 15% ) Harper Perennial Eleanor Herman
Binding: PaperbackDewey Decimal Number: 940.099EAN: 9780060585440ISBN: 0060585447Label: Harper PerennialManufacturer: Harper PerennialNumber Of Items: 1Number Of Pages: 320Publication Date: 2005-04-01Publisher: Harper PerennialRelease Date: 2005-04-05Studio: Harper Perennial
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Editorial Reviews: Throughout the centuries, royal mistresses have been worshiped, feared, envied, and reviled. They set the fashions, encouraged the arts, and, in some cases, ruled nations. Eleanor Herman's Sex with Kings takes us into the throne rooms and bedrooms of Europe's most powerful monarchs. Alive with flamboyant characters, outrageous humor, and stirring poignancy, this glittering tale of passion and politics chronicles five hundred years of scintillating women and the kings who loved them.
Curiously, the main function of a royal mistress was not to provide the king with sex but with companionship. Forced to marry repulsive foreign princesses, kings sought solace with women of their own choice. And what women they were! From Madame de Pompadour, the famous mistress of Louis XV, who kept her position for nineteen years despite her frigidity, to modern-day Camilla Parker-Bowles, who usurped none other than the glamorous Diana, Princess of Wales.
The successful royal mistress made herself irreplaceable. She was ready to converse gaily with him when she was tired, make love until all hours when she was ill, and cater to his every whim. Wearing a mask of beaming delight over any and all discomforts, she was never to be exhausted, complaining, or grief-stricken.
True, financial rewards for services rendered were of royal proportions -- some royal mistresses earned up to $200 million in titles, pensions, jewels, and palaces. Some kings allowed their mistresses to exercise unlimited political power. But for all its grandeur, a royal court was a scorpion's nest of insatiable greed, unquenchable lust, and vicious ambition. Hundreds of beautiful women vied to unseat the royal mistress. Many would suffer the slings and arrows of negative public opinion, some met with tragic ends and were pensioned off to make room for younger women. But the royal mistress often had the last laugh, as she lived well and richly off the fruits of her "sins."
From the dawn of time, power has been a mighty aphrodisiac. With diaries, personal letters, and diplomatic dispatches, Eleanor Herman's trailblazing research reveals the dynamics of sex and power, rivalry and revenge, at the most brilliant courts of Europe. Wickedly witty and endlessly entertaining, Sex with Kings is a chapter of women's history that has remained unwritten -- until now.
Spotlight customer reviews: Customer Rating: Summary: Such a fascinating bookComment: For as long as there have been kings, kings have had mistresses. But, who were these women, what did they want and what did they get out of being the king's lover? In this fascinating book, author Eleanor Herman takes an unvarnished look at the secret life of the royal mistresses, the maitresse-en-titre - covering everything from why women would desire such a position to what the position entailed, and goes forward to what was the eventual fate of the royal mistress.
Customer Rating: Summary: TABLOIDS OF THE PASTComment: Author Herman gives us a racy, fun, interesting, fascinating, sexy look at the 'royals' and their lovers of the past. I enjoyed it and thought she did an outstanding job in bringing some of these flamboyant, humorous characters (and sometimes ugly and nasty) to life for us to have a chuckle in the 21st Century. I also liked her dressed up in her royal dress and crown - nice touch! It's obvious that Princess Diana and the Windsors come from a long history of love, lust and romance. There's nothing new between 'boys and girls' but it's still intriguing and fun to read about it from the past. The research was excellent and I'm sure the author's family lost her many days to the archaives and museums. Imagine what the modern paparazzi could have done with Charles II or Henry VIII, or Lola Montez or Lady Castlemaine? The index was very helpful in keeping all the players straight.Customer Rating: Summary: wildly entertainingComment: one of the funniest and most interesting books i have ever read. i would highly recommend this book. think of it as a sassy history of monarchs.Customer Rating: Summary: another hitComment: this author make history something you want to read.i can't wait for her next book.Customer Rating: Summary: Great idea, but...Comment: I couldn't wait to read this book, but when I saw the photo of the author in a costume, I started to worry. Very interesting subject material, but the organization made me crazy - people kept jumping back and forth in time, I felt as if I were reading the same story over and over again. And yes, some of the stories were fascinating, but the book seemed like an overlong magazine article. Very disappointing.
