Georgiana Spencer was the Duchess of Devonshire in the late 1700's and early 1800's. She is famous mostly because of a famous painting of her by Thomas Gainsborough, and also because she was an ancestor of Princess Diana. The author of this biography attempts to make the case that the Duchess of Devonshire was also an influential political adviser to members of Parliament and royalty. The Duchess and her husband, the Duke, were members of a faction of the Whig party. They supported more democracy and limits on the power of the aristocracy and King.
This biography quotes from many of the Duchess's own letters and diaries, as well as the letters and diaries of her friends and contemporaries. The quotes and excerpts introduce the language and manner of speech from that era into this modern biography . This in turn gives the biography an atmosphere similar to a Jane Austen novel, albeit a rather debauched Jane Austen.
The reason it's debauched is because the Duchess was an adulterer, gambler, and spendthrift, and the Devonshire household was very irregular. What made the household irregular was that the Duke of Devonshire was basically a polygamist. Their household included the Duchess's best friend, Lady Elizabeth, and the Duke fathered the children of both the Duchess and Lady Elizabeth.
So there are three key elements to the Duchesses life. Her political activities, her finances, and her love life. The author clearly admires and sympathizes with the subject of her book, however, most readers will probably find the Duchess a rather silly and foolish woman.
The author attempts to make the Duchess a serious person by attributing political opinions and activities to her. However, most of the evidence reviewed in this book doesn't really support the view that she had much political influence or impact on events. She just socialized with some of the prominent personalities of her time.
The author claims the Duchess was always deeply in debt and struggled to make payments on it. However, there isn't much evidence to support the view that she was ever in any serious threat of being sent to debtors prison. Her family and friends always seemed to have money to bail her out. And the people she borrowed money from wouldn't have kept lending money to her if they seriously thought there was real risk of it not being repaid.
The Duchess had a very strange love life. She not only didn't seem to mind her husband fathering the children of her best friend, but she supposedly gave birth to a child fathered by another man. It was all very sorted and disgusting. It reminds one that the so-called upper classes and the lower classes often have a lot in common. They tend to conduct their lives more like animals than people.
But despite the vulgar and debauched lives of the characters in this biography, it is still a rather enjoyable book. If readers enjoy Jane Austen's novels, they will likely enjoy this book. It is similar in style and is about characters who were contemporaries of Austen's characters. The only difference is that the characters in this biography would have been the villains in an Austen novel and not the heroes.
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