By K. McAlister
Weddings are always exciting, but the upcoming wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton is exciting to many on an international scale. Many of us watched the wedding of William's parents, Prince Charles and Lady Diana Spencer on July 29th, 1981, and we celebrated the birth of Prince William Arthur
Philip Louis, the heir to the throne, on June 21st, 1982. Now history will be made again when the prince marries his princess on April 29, 2011. If you would like books about Prince William and his bride-to-be, or about other Royal weddings, try:
Royal Romance, Modern Marriage: the Love Story of William and Kate - Amy Hansen - ON ORDER
William and Kate: Celebrating a Royal Engagement - Robin Nunn - ON ORDER
Royal Wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton - Life Magazine - ON ORDER
William and Kate: A Royal Love Story - Christopher P. Anderson
William: HRH Prince William of Wales - Tim Graham and Peter Archer
Kate: The Making of a Princess - Claudia Joseph
Queen and Consort: Elizabeth and Philip: 60 Years of Marriage - Lynne Bell
Five Gold Rings: a Royal Wedding Souvenir Album from Queen Victoria to Queen Elizabeth II - Jane Roberts
For those of you who prefer the more infamous side of royalty, we have books for you, too. The histories of the world's royal families include centuries of war, insanity, beheadings, love affairs, genetic defects, divorce, abdications, power and tyranny. Royalty set the fashion standards for clothing, behavior, excess and frivolity.
We have many books on the ever fascinating Tudor King Henry VIII, who enjoyed weddings so much that he had six of them. (In order, his wives were "divorced, beheaded, died, divorced, beheaded, survived"). Catherine de Medici decreed that all ladies of her court had to have waists no bigger than 13 inches, creating a long-lasting fashion for corsets. To escape the confines of court life, Marie-Antoinette and her ladies would dress up to play at being milkmaids and shepherdesses. For years after Prince Albert's death, the widowed Queen Victoria had her staff lay out his clothes each day and take hot water to his room. England's King George III went mad from time to time and had to be tied to a chair. If you prefer dark-and-seedy to pomp-and-circumstance, you might enjoy the following:
Behind the Palace Doors: Five centuries of sex, adventure, vice, treachery, and folly from Royal Britain - Michael Farquhar
Sex with Kings: 500 years of adultery, power, rivalry, and revenge - Eleanor Herman
Sex with the Queen: 900 years of vile kings, virile lovers, and passionate politics - Eleanor Herman
Royal Affairs: a lusty romp through the extramarital adventures that rocked the British Monarchy - Leslie Carroll
Royal Babylon: the larming history of European Royalty - Karl Shaw
The Private World of the Duke and Duchess of Windsor - Hugo Vickers
The Duchess of Windsor: the Secret Life - Charles Higham
Doomed Queens: Royal Women who Met Bad Ends, From Cleopatra to Princess Di - Kris Waldherr
If you would like to read contemporary newspaper accounts of past monarchs, the Calgary Public Library subscribes to the digital newspaper archive for the Times of London, covering the years 1785-1985.You can find this database in our E-Library, under "History and Genealogy".