Francis I: The Maker of Modern France
Written by Leonie Frieda
Narrated by Carole Boyd
4/5
()
About this audiobook
The bestselling author of Catherine de Medici returns to sixteenth-century Europe in this evocative and entertaining biography that recreates a remarkable era of French history and brings to life a great monarch—Francis I—who turned France into a great nation.
Catherine de Medici’s father-in-law, King Francis of France, was the perfect Renaissance knight, the movement’s exemplar and its Gallic interpreter. An aesthete, diplomat par excellence, and contemporary of Machiavelli, Francis was the founder of modern France, whose sheer force of will and personality molded his kingdom into the first European superpower. Arguably the man who introduced the Renaissance to France, Francis was also the prototype Frenchman—a national identity was modeled on his character. So great was his stamp, that few countries even now are quite so robustly patriotic as is France. Yet as Leonie Frieda reveals, Francis did not always live up to his ideal; a man of grand passions and vision, he was also a flawed husband, father, lover, and king.
With access to private archives that have never been used in a study of Francis I, Frieda explores the life of a man who was the most human of the monarchs of the period—and yet, remains the most elusive.
Supplemental enhancement PDF accompanies the audiobook.
Leonie Frieda
Leonie Frieda is the author of a bestselling biography of Catherine de Medici and The Deadly Sisterhood: A Story of Women, Power and Intrigue in the Italian Renaissance. She lives in London.
Related to Francis I
Related audiobooks
Princes of the Renaissance Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Madame de Pompadour: The Life and Legacy of French King Louis XV’s Chief Mistress Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Emperor Charlemagne Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Four Queens: The Provencal Sisters Who Ruled Europe Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Queens of the Crusades: Eleanor of Aquitaine and her Successors Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Lost Heirs of the Medieval Crown: The Kings and Queens Who Never Were Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Mistress Anne Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Great Catherine: The Life of Catherine the Great, Empress of Russia Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Great Harry: A Biography of Henry VIII Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Two Houses, Two Kingdoms: A History of France and England, 1100-1300 Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5King of the North Wind: The Life of Henry II in Five Acts Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Henrietta Maria: The Warrior Queen Who Divided a Nation Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Lost King of France: How DNA Solved the Mystery of the Murdered Son of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Pirate Queen: Queen Elizabeth I, Her Pirate Adventurers, and the Dawn of Empire Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Betrayal of the Duchess: The Scandal That Unmade the Bourbon Monarchy and Made France Modern Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsMarie-Antoinette: The Making of a French Queen Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Lancaster and York Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Normans: From Raiders to Kings Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Elizabeth of York Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Plantagenet Princesses: The Daughters of Eleanor of Aquitaine and Henry II Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Age of Napoleon Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Hundred Years War: The English in France 1337-1453 Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Richard III: The Self-Made King Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Demon's Brood: A History of the Plantagenet Dynasty Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Tudor: Passion. Manipulation. Murder. The Story of England's Most Notorious Royal Family Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Imprudent King: A New Life of Philip II Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Emperor: A New Life of Charles V Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Borgias: Power and Depravity in Renaissance Italy Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5
European History For You
Project MK-Ultra: The History of the CIA’s Controversial Human Experimentation Program Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Teutonic Knights: A Military History Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Royal Art of Poison: Filthy Palaces, Fatal Cosmetics, Deadly Medicine, and Murder Most Foul Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Our Hideous Progeny: A Novel Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The War on the West Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Wars of the Roses: The Fall of the Plantagenets and the Rise of the Tudors Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Invention of Murder: How the Victorians Revelled in Death and Detection and Created Modern Crime Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Women in White Coats: How the First Women Doctors Changed the World of Medicine Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Over My Dead Body: Unearthing the Hidden History of American Cemeteries Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Children of Ash and Elm: A History of the Vikings Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Third Reich: A History of Nazi Germany Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Diana: Her True Story in Her Own Words Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Five: The Untold Lives of the Women Killed by Jack the Ripper Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Mysterious Case of Rudolf Diesel: Genius, Power, and Deception on the Eve of World War I Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Ripper: The Secret Life of Walter Sickert Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Iron, Fire and Ice: The Real History that Inspired Game of Thrones Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Ten Caesars: Roman Emperors from Augustus to Constantine Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5They Thought They Were Free: The Germans, 1933-45 Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5We Don't Know Ourselves: A Personal History of Modern Ireland Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Ghost Map Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Templars: The History and the Myth: From Solomon's Temple to the Freemasons Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Professor and The Madman: A Tale of Murder, Insanity, and the Making of the Oxford English Dictionary Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Napoleon Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Sovietistan: Travels in Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Uzbekistan Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Short Stories Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Whose Middle Ages?: Teachable Moments for an Ill-Used Past Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Killing England: The Brutal Struggle for American Independence Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Finding Freedom: Harry and Meghan and the Making of a Modern Royal Family Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Related categories
Reviews for Francis I
17 ratings1 review
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Henry VIII of England, Charles V of the Empire, Suleiman the Magnificent of the Ottomans, and Francis I of France all were young men who came to their thrones at about the same time. Henry VIII and Francis I, in particular, had a lot in common; both had slightly controversial claims to the throne, both were fond of the ladies, and both sought military glory with indifferent success. Author Leonie Frieda describes Francis in her subtitle as “The Maker of Modern France”, but doesn’t present a lot of evidence for that characterization; he was a patron of the arts, persuading Da Vinci to spend his last years in France, but he also kept using a medieval style of warfare, resulting in a narrow victory at Marignano and a disastrous defeat at Pavia. He doesn’t seem to have been particularly interested in governing, preferring hunting, travel, and women; one courtier commented “Alexander the Great attended to women after attending to business; Francis I attends to business after attending to women”. Contemporaries speculated that this did him in, from syphilis; when he died at age 53 the embalmers described him as “rotten inside” but Frieda considers this unlikely.Frieda has lively, conversational writing style and I found this an easy read. There are maps of France, the Empire, and Italy; genealogical charts for France and the Empire, and a list of principal characters; plates illustrating most of them; endnotes and a copious bibliography.