John Guy > Quotes

“As the common people say, Only harlots marry in May.”
― John Guy, Queen of Scots: The True Life of Mary Stuart

“to see her not merely as a bundle of stereotypes or as a convenient and tenuously linked series of myths, but as a whole woman whose choices added up and whose decisions made sense.”
― John Guy, Queen of Scots: The True Life of Mary Stuart

“If there is any debate about peace, do not discuss each clause with excessive subtlety, for exactness produces contention and contention excites and ignites the dangerous flames of hatred.” Consider the bigger picture and the damage that will accrue to the church if you persist in your quarrel,”
― John Guy, Thomas Becket: Warrior, Priest, Rebel

“Huntly was also taken, but died of a stroke while still mounted on his horse. His corpse was embalmed and sent to Edinburgh, where it was kept until the following May, when it was put on trial in Parliament. As the clerk’s report put it, “The coffin was set upright, as if the earl stood on his feet.” He was then found guilty of treason, and the family estates were declared forfeit.”
― John Guy, Queen of Scots: The True Life of Mary Stuart

“Canterbury, despoiled of her goods,”
― John Guy, Thomas Becket: Warrior, Priest, Rebel

“Learning that flowered in days of yore In these our times is thought a bore. Once knowledge was a well to drink of; Now having fun is all men think of.”
― John Guy, Thomas Becket: Warrior, Priest, Rebel

“Moray was in Glasgow when he heard the news of her escape.”
― John Guy, Queen of Scots: The True Life of Mary Stuart

“any case, Arran’s reconciliation to Beaton was only the prelude to his efforts to stage a comeback.”
― John Guy, Queen of Scots: The True Life of Mary Stuart

“the controversy surrounding the eight letters produced by Moray to justify the charges in Buchanan’s dossier.”
― John Guy, Queen of Scots: The True Life of Mary Stuart

“Mary was eating with a group of friends, including Rizzio.”
― John Guy, Queen of Scots: The True Life of Mary Stuart

“believing that whatever else she did, she would be surrounded by treachery and deceit.”
― John Guy, Queen of Scots: The True Life of Mary Stuart

“She rode out of Edinburgh at the head of between eight and ten thousand men,”
― John Guy, Queen of Scots: The True Life of Mary Stuart

“all I can tell you is that I account myself one of the happiest women in the world.”
― John Guy, Queen of Scots: The True Life of Mary Stuart

“he was expelled from the castle by Moray and the laird and forbidden to return.”
― John Guy, Queen of Scots: The True Life of Mary Stuart

“which she valued so much that she later placed it with the Scottish crown jewels.”
― John Guy, Queen of Scots: The True Life of Mary Stuart

“Patrick was a Scottish patriot: pro-French and anti-English, but also an opportunist who flirted with England”
― John Guy, Queen of Scots: The True Life of Mary Stuart

“England, Scotland and France, it was actually between England, the Lords of the Congregation and the Guises,”
― John Guy, Queen of Scots: The True Life of Mary Stuart

“his goal, unlike Elizabeth’s, was to keep her off the throne.”
― John Guy, Queen of Scots: The True Life of Mary Stuart

“it was impossible to believe they would stay on the same side for long.”
― John Guy, Queen of Scots: The True Life of Mary Stuart

“She was not allowed to write to him,”
― John Guy, Queen of Scots: The True Life of Mary Stuart

“The claim of Francis and Mary to the English throne would be dropped.”
― John Guy, Queen of Scots: The True Life of Mary Stuart

“Mary kissed her gentlewomen, who burst into uncontrolled fits of sobbing.”
― John Guy, Queen of Scots: The True Life of Mary Stuart

“Henry II wanted to launch a counterattack, especially against England.”
― John Guy, Queen of Scots: The True Life of Mary Stuart

“I am settled,” she said, “in the ancient Roman Catholic religion, and mind to spend my blood in defense of it.”
― John Guy, Queen of Scots: The True Life of Mary Stuart

“because the regent’s power was limited by the terms of the treaty of Haddington.”
― John Guy, Queen of Scots: The True Life of Mary Stuart

“in exchange for which she would be recognized as Elizabeth’s heir apparent.”
― John Guy, Queen of Scots: The True Life of Mary Stuart

“outnumbering her opponents by five to one.”
― John Guy, Queen of Scots: The True Life of Mary Stuart

“than of a border skirmish that went tragically wrong.”
― John Guy, Queen of Scots: The True Life of Mary Stuart

“When she set out back to Aberdeen, he planned to seize her as she forded the River Spey.”
― John Guy, Queen of Scots: The True Life of Mary Stuart

“It was now up to Mary herself to see if she could reshuffle their discarded hand.”
― John Guy, Queen of Scots: The True Life of Mary Stuart