LoveReading Says
A humourous, historical tale bringing together the medieval chivalry of Chaucer’s time along with the savageness of the age. There is plenty if intrigue, back stabbing and moral corruptness to make this a pacy romp of a novel, as well as thought provoking stuff about one of the most interesting periods of British history.
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Chaucer's Triumph Synopsis
Geoffrey Chaucer has some claim to being the greatest of English poets, as well as the father of our language. Yet there has always lurked a dark secret in his life, a scandal or crime which, from evidence of two different legal documents of his time, has intrigued and mystified scholars for generations, dividing them into warring factions.
In the five days before Prince John of Gaunt's London funeral in March 1399, the body of the great Plantagenet prince is being brought from Leicester Castle for burial in St Paul's. Setting out with it are his family, royal mourners, Katherine Swynford, recently married to him and now his widow, Geoffrey Chaucer, and Adam Scriven, the poet's resentful scrivener or copyist. Not far away, in King's Langley, King Richard II, Gaunt's nephew, who has survived as king only under his protection, plans and manoeuvres to seize Gaunt's huge Lancastrian inheritance and even his body.
Scriven, who is engaged in copying the last Canterbury Tale, wants to use this final occasion to discover and test once and for all the truth about Chaucer's crime. But more is at stake than the poet's reputation: the future of England and Gaunt's royal line.
About This Edition
| ISBN: |
9780955376801 |
| Publication date: |
5th February 2007 |
| Author: |
Garry O'connor |
| Publisher: |
Petrak Press |
| Format: |
Hardback |
| Pagination: |
294 pages |
| Primary Genre |
Historical Fiction
|
About Garry O'connor
Apart from his well-known biographies, the most recent of which, Universal Father, was of Pope John Paul II, Garry O'Connor has published two novels: Darlings of the Gods, which was filmed as a mini-series from his original non-fiction book - 'The mythology of one of the century's most celebrated marriages [of Laurence Olivier and Vivien Leigh] a brilliantly perceptive portrait', according to the Observer; and Campion's Ghost, about which The Sunday Times wrote, 'That O'Connor manages to re-create figures such as Jonne Donne and Elizabeth I in many complex and unexpected ways is a tribute to his skill. Donne becomes almost the symbol of the age. Not only is he at the heart of the renaissance, but he also embodies in his private anguish the bloody battle between Catholicism and Protestantism.' Time Out described Campion's Ghost as 'A learned and compelling story a historical novel which carries the pungent whiff of authenticity.'The author adapted it into a play for BBC Radio 4, starring Paul McGann and Timothy West.
More About Garry O'connor
