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Product Description
Review
'a fascinating account of the other woman through history, more sobering than titillating.' - Sunday Times 'It is not just mistresses, it seems, who need to wake up to the new millennium; one of the surprises of this engrossing book is how mired in myth and fantasy it reveals our attitude to mistresses as being.' Sunday Telegraph '[Abbott] is one of the most respected non-fiction writers in Canada' - The Gazette (Montreal). 'Engaging and full of fun anecdotes and salacious details' - Toronto Star.
--This text refers to the
Hardcover
edition.
Book Description
She has been known as the 'kept woman', the 'fancy woman' and the 'other woman'. She is both a fictional character and flesh-and-blood human being. But who is she, really? What do Madame de Pompadour, Heloise, Marilyn Monroe, Jane Eyre and Camilla Parker-Bowles have in common? Why do women become mistresses, and what is it like to have a private life that is usually also a secret life? Is a mistress merely a wife-in-waiting, or is she the very definition of the modern emancipated, independent female? In "A History of Mistresses" Elizabeth Abbott intelligently probes the motives and morals of some of history's most infamous and fascinating women. Drawing intimate portraits of those who have - either by chance, coercion or choice - assumed this complex role, from Chinese concubines and European royal mistresses to mobster molls and trophy dolls, "A History of Mistresses" offers a rich blend of history, personality and cultural study.
--This text refers to the
Hardcover
edition.
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Most helpful customer reviews
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars
The History of Non-Celibacy,
By
This review is from: History Of Mistresses (Paperback)
A History of Mistresses by Elizabeth Abbott is a sweeping social history of mistresses from Ancient times to Modern Days. The book contains thirteen chapters, chronologically and thematically organized, that are subdivided into individual case studies on historically well known mistresses.The book starts out chronologically in the ancient world with the Biblical mistress Hagar then goes into the Eastern Orient and Persian Harems. The book then has a chapter for European royal mistresses and a separate chapter for European aristocracy. It has chapters for papal consorts and one for mistresses and conquerors. There are chapters based on interracial sexual unions and one chapter I found very interesting about Jewish mistresses in Nazi Germany. There are also thematically based chapters featuring mistresses as muses, mobster molls, and trophy dolls as well as fictional mistresses in literature. Finally, the author concludes with modern case studies of mistresses after the 1960s and their continued evolution within western culture. I found that I read this book in sections rather than as a whole, because some parts of the book like the ancient case studies were more interesting to me than others like the modern period. The author has done a wonderful job compiling a ton of information in one tome with extensive end notes, but I found that the book struggled in the last chapter perhaps because modern mistresses may not be as well known or understood as their historical counterparts.
4 of 6 people found the following review helpful
3.0 out of 5 stars
Interesting at first... but leaves you feeling empty,
By A Customer
This review is from: History Of Mistresses (Paperback)
This book starts out as intriguing and interesting but leaves you feeling empty in the end, as if you learned a little but not too much. It's more of a tease. Perhaps that's what it's like to be a mistress...
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta) Amazon.com:
4.0 out of 5 stars (1 customer review) 1 of 11 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars
Much about Eva Braun is inaccurate,
By Thomas Lundmark - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Mistresses (Hardcover)
While I enjoyed perusing this well written book, I cannot give it 5 stars because much of what the author writes about Eva Braun is not accurate. For a better account of the relationship between Eva Braun and Adolf Hitler, see my new, authoritative biography "The Untold Story of Eva Braun: Her Life beyond Hitler"
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