Amanda Elyot, Too Great a Lady

Too Great a Lady

Amanda Elyot

NAL, Feb 2007, $14.00

ISBN: 0451220544

Before she became known as "The Notorious Emma," "Lady Hamilton," or "That Woman," Emma Hamilton was born in poverty in the 1760s in Wales. She escaped to London Town by the mid 1780's by performing as famous women of history or mythology like Circe on the stage. There she perfected the lessons she learned in Welsh country of the attitudes of affectation as not even Cleopatra could perform the role of herself better than the overly-pretentious sexuality that Emma displayed. By the early-nineteenth century, "That Hamilton Woman" became the lover of the Napoleonic War hero Lord Nelson. After his death, she fell back into poverty before dying in exile in 1815 with young Horatia (who might have been the offspring of Emma and Nelson) as her only companion; her beloved's family only provided part of her Bronte pension as they cut her out of Lord Nelson's will.

This is an interesting historical "autobiography" as Lady Emma Hamilton tells her story in a mostly first person account. The tale showcases a woman who uses her sexual lures as a means to feed her and her mother via a strong of protectors until her last one, Lord Nelson, is apparently the one. Though not for everyone, fans of Georgian-regency romances will want to read the tale of the most notorious kept woman of the era; she used her siren skills to keep food on the table for herself and her mom in just about the only way a single, unprotected female could during that period while eventually, with Nelson, forming one of the great romances of all time.

Harriet Klausner