Gone with the Windsors

On this day in 1936 Edward VIII became the Duke of Windsor. The abdication came as an enormous shock to an empire that was already in a precarious condition. Royal doings had no real importance here in America, but the reports were very interesting, especially on some phone exchanges in Upper East Side New York and Palm Beach. The idea that a king would give up his throne and his important job of opening grocery stores and accepting keys to cities to marry an American divorcee, actually a double divorcee. It makes you wonder what marital skills the duchess possessed. It's rumored she was a hermaphrodite (unproven) and a bit of a gymnast (not hard to visualize with that hairdo).

The Duke and Duchess were and remain interesting for being trivial, and A Book of Ages includes many of those small, telling details. For instance, the last thing Edward VIII did as king was have his toenails done. I also chronicle the Duke's flirtation with the Nazis, the number of pieces of luggage he took with him on his sudden escape from France in 1940, his card playing habits, his wife's complaints, the couple's various haunts down the years. He defined the role of "has been", which makes him a useful marker in a book about career arcs.

Paradise Lost

Today's John Milton's birthday. Born in 1608, he lived through one monarchy, a revolution, a brief republic, a dictatorship (disguised as a protectorate), then a restoration of monarchy. Being politically active, a political flack in fact, he rose and fell as changes occurred, spending time in favor and then in prison. He was also going blind as surely as Thurber, whose birthday was yesterday. He dictated much of his poetry to assistant Andrew Marvell, who was himself a great poet. Milton wrote Paradise Lost and Paradise Regained. For the former landmark in English literature his publisher paid him £10. He also wrote The Doctrine and Discipline of Divorce (he was unhappily married), which probably means he was no Puritan, despite his allegiances. John Milton appears four times in A Book of Ages.

William the Conqueror

On October 14, 1066, William, Duke of Normandy, defeated Harold, the last of the Saxon kings of England, at the Battle of Hastings. The decisive moment comes when William pretended to withdraw his force, luring the Saxons out of their defensive position. At age 38, Duke William became known as William the Conqueror and King of England. He appears once in A Book of Ages.

Mary Queen of Scots (and son)

On this day in 1567 Mary Queen of Scots was deposed and replaced by her son James VI. James was a year old; Mary was 24.

Scotland had a thing for young monarchs. Mary herself had become queen when she was four days old. She married the king of France when she was 14. She had an eventful but unhappy life, shuttling between France and Scotland, spending the last 20 years of it imprisoned by her former subjects and then by her cousin Queen Elizabeth of England, who had her executed in 1587. Being high-born is no picnic. To most of the people she knew and trusted Mary Queen of Scots was either a convenience or a dangerous nuisance. She appears five times in A Book of Ages.

Her son, James VI of Scotland, would become James I of England, patron of Shakespeare and the King James Bible. He appears once in A Book of Ages.