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3d21e89
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This was the moment he most loved about tourneying, that first glorious sortie with banners streaming, trumpets blaring, and the earth atremble with pounding hooves as hundreds of knights came together in a spectacular clash of sound and fury.
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tourney
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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802a30c
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Removing his helmet, Edward knelt by the stream called Swillgate, a name that effectively quenched any desire to drink from its depths.
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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11d9de2
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When people want to insult a man, they cast slurs upon his courage. But the worst they can say about a woman is to impugn her chastity.
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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257e85b
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The Welsh were a god-cursed, stiff-necked, and utterly vexatious people, John said bitterly, but they did have an inexplicable ability to rise phoenixlike from the ashes of defeat, to soar upwards on wings too scorched for flight.
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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19ade80
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It was a basic tenet of faith with men of Ranulf's class that a knight, trained in the ways of war since boyhood, could easily vanquish lesser foes, as much a belief in the superiority of blood and breeding as in the benefits of battle lore and killing competence. Ranulf had accepted this comforting conviction, too, but no one seemed to have told his assailants that they were inferior adversaries.
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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2099b9c
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You might as well face it. You're not going to be able to fight for the crown. You'll just have to grit your teeth and let us hand it over to you at the bargaining table.
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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7eeb3ae
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Geoffrey looked startled to see both his great-uncles bearing down upon him with such haste; he hadn't realized men their age could move so fast.
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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fb1941a
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All he wanted was enough time to consider all his options without being dragged into his household's petty squabbles or being nagged by his wife about that damnable pilgrimage. Was that so much to ask? Apparently so, for he'd yet to find a peaceful moment at Caen, not with Marguerite sulking and Aimar lurking and Will acting put-upon and Geoff wanting to lay plans and Richard strutting around as if he were the incarnation of Roland and poor..
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humour
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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078c699
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I once came upon a definition of history as 'the process by which complex truths are transformed into simplified falsehoods'. That is particularly true in the case of Richard III, where the normal medieval proclivity for moralizing and partisanship was further complicated by deliberate distortion to serve Tudor political needs.
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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85afdd7
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Eleanor would have been indifferent to the immorality of her adultery, but would never have forgiven the stupidity of it.
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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76c07ac
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Tonight," he said, "we shall get quietly and thoroughly drunk...in memory of all that was lost. And on the morrow, I begin the struggle to win it back."
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struggles
wales
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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42a635d
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He would never be able to emulate Richard's last gesture of defiance--gallant, glorious, and quite mad.
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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7f050de
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Oh, John is clever enough. But what do brains avail a man if he does lack for backbone?
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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2f00423
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War is the least productive of men's pastimes, and the most indulgent.
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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4526754
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Poor Wales, so far from Heaven, so close to England!
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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8037da7
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Indeed. But I was not thinking of his immortal soul, Matilda. I was thinking that history is chronicled by monks.
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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49c5974
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I've never been so hungry that I was willing to lick honey off thorns.
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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f3b78c1
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Hell and furies!" Eleanor had begun to pace, her skirts swirling about her ankles. "What was he thinking?" "When does he ever think?" Richard straddled a chair and accepted a wine cup from Raoul. "If he were to sell his brain, he could claim it had never been used."
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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e5b4fd2
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Barbed banter was the coin of their realm and heartfelt admissions of affection were rejected out of hand as counterfeit.
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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815ec30
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To call it a "setback" is like calling the Expulsion from Eden a minor misunderstanding."
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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8efcf93
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Get some sleep. Our troubles will still be there on the morrow
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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55a9a9d
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If disliking Richard be grounds for accusing a man of conspiracy, I daresay you could implicate half of Christendom in this so-called plot. Richard endears himself easiest to those who've yet to meet him.
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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1439335
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How fragile life was, how fleeting their days on earth, and how fickle was Death, claiming the young as often as the old, the healthy as often as the ailing, cruelly stealing away a baby's first breath, a mother's fading heartbeat.
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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4b4558c
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What is forgiveness worth without trust?
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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d0057f3
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Troubles may ofttimes be so dire that they cannot get better. But they are never so dire that they still cannot get worse.
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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825554c
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If that's how you'd rather remember it. But I did not mean that as a reproach. I do not, in truth, think less of you for having the common sense to abandon a ship once waves began to break over the bow. Nor, after sixteen years shut away from the sun, am I likely to find tears to spare for Henry Plantagenet.
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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7314992
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After that, he was still. They could hear church bells chiming in the distance. Somewhere Vespers was being rung, people were at Mass, life was going on. Andre had not thought there was a need for words of farewell, not between them. But now he found himself approaching the bed, suddenly afraid that he'd waited too long. "Richard." He held his breath then, until the other man opened his eyes. "Listen to me," he said hoarsely. "You will not ..
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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157670c
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His was a lonely, unorthodox conviction that war was man's ultimate failure.
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middle-ages
kings
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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4e15f39
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She wanted to order him clapped in irons, as he so deserved. But she was stopped by what she saw in the faces of the watching men: disapproval, instinctive and involuntary, but disapproval, nonetheless. They were not comfortable when power was wielded by a woman, not at a man's expense, a man who had just acquitted himself so spectacularly at Lincoln, winning their reluctant respect in a way she knew she never could.
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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816e0b8
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She might be that most unfortunate of women, a barren queen,
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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a8b9c3d
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There are secret sins and found-out sins, and it is foolish to worry about the first until it becomes the second.
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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0d86707
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It puzzled Maud that her male relatives could not see this. Was it that men could not believe a woman might share their ambitions, their need for power? Eleanor saw herself as more than Henry's queen, mother of his children. First and foremost, she was Duchess of Aquitaine, never doubting that she could have ruled as well as any man and better than most.
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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64010b9
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More than men had died at Lincoln. It seemed to Stephen that reality was a casualty, too, for nothing made sense anymore. What was he doing here in the solar of Lincoln Castle, bleeding all over the Earl of Chester's wife?
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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ec97766
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He believed that his superior intellect mattered more than his physical defects and saw no reason why he must defer to these fortunate young men with handsome faces and healthy bodies and empty heads.
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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3cbd8a1
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He'd never seen one so vibrant, though, or so vividly compelling... those glowing green eyes sparkling with sunlight and curiosity and silent laughter, and when she glanced in Henry's direction, she held his gaze, a look that was both challenging and enigmatic... He was utterly certain that this was Eleanor of Aquitaine, and no less sure that the French King must be one of God's greatest fools.
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vibrant
fools
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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75702be
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Those who served both the Almighty and secular lords did their best to follow Jesus's teachings and render unto Caesar the things which were Caesar's, and unto God the things that were God's, all the while praying they'd never have to choose between the two.
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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15ee7e2
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Well, dearest, what would you tell a farmer who had an over-abundant harvest? To plant less, of course!"... "I am not complaining about the frequency of the planting," she said. "I'd just rather not reap a crop every year."
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sex
humour
harvest
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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cbf1f16
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when a man fell into a deep hole, it was usually a good idea to stop digging.
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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41b4158
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The book is Brittany and the Angevins: Province and Empire, 1158-1203, by Judith A. Everard,
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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2350d5f
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Richard grinned, very pleased with himself for having found a way to honor his mother, thwart his father, and serve God, while having a grand adventure at the same time.
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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df5b5e3
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It is not easy to be stranded between two worlds, the sad truth is that we can never feel completely comfortable in either world
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human-nature
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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3ec2040
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as was his way, once he acknowledged the problem, he set about finding a means to resolve it
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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43a993d
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He was too astute a politician, too ambitious a Prince, to confuse friendship with statecraft.
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Sharon Kay Penman |
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9897bf7
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But in all honesty, I do not find it so peculiar a notion, that a Welshman should rule Wales.
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Sharon Kay Penman |