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A Measure of Understanding
The autobiography of the Queen Mother of Greece's last King.
270 pages, Hardcover
First published May 27, 1971
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About the author
Queen Frederica of Greece
2 books2 followersPrincess of Hanover. Princess of Greece from 1938 until 1947. Queen Consort of Greece from 1947 until 1964 as the wife of King Paul, thereafter Dowager Queen during the reign of her son, King Constantine II.
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
March 20, 2023
I enjoy reading memoirs, and especially Royal memoirs. I expect them to be biased, or a white wash of vents that have been objectively documented, or just a bit kooky. But they are also intensely interesting to me as I keep all their short comings in mind.
Queen Frederika was the mother of the last king of Greece (Constantine II who recently passed away himself in 2023). She was a Princess of Hanover (a German duchy) and a granddaughter of Kaiser Wilhelm. She married Paul crown prince of Greece and either through her upbringing and her marriage she knew almost every Royal personage living in her times.
She also had a reputation as a manipulative, bossy, and relatively unpleasant person….. So naturally, she’d want to reprint in her memoirs page after page of letters written to the great statesmen of the day: Jan Smuts, Winston Churchill, and (the poor man) General George Marshall. In these letters she goes on and on and on advocating for help for Greece. They make her look overbearing, clueless (for example Marshall had ceased being Secretary of State and from the party out of power for years worth of her letters). They do little to dispel the rumors.
And then there is all the philosophy, and babbling about nuclear physics. I know Greece is the historic home of philosophy, but this doesn’t make her look more Greek as much as it makes her look like she doesn’t know what a reader will find interesting coming from a deposed queen mother.
Glad I read, but what a bizarre effort.
Queen Frederika was the mother of the last king of Greece (Constantine II who recently passed away himself in 2023). She was a Princess of Hanover (a German duchy) and a granddaughter of Kaiser Wilhelm. She married Paul crown prince of Greece and either through her upbringing and her marriage she knew almost every Royal personage living in her times.
She also had a reputation as a manipulative, bossy, and relatively unpleasant person….. So naturally, she’d want to reprint in her memoirs page after page of letters written to the great statesmen of the day: Jan Smuts, Winston Churchill, and (the poor man) General George Marshall. In these letters she goes on and on and on advocating for help for Greece. They make her look overbearing, clueless (for example Marshall had ceased being Secretary of State and from the party out of power for years worth of her letters). They do little to dispel the rumors.
And then there is all the philosophy, and babbling about nuclear physics. I know Greece is the historic home of philosophy, but this doesn’t make her look more Greek as much as it makes her look like she doesn’t know what a reader will find interesting coming from a deposed queen mother.
Glad I read, but what a bizarre effort.
February 8, 2022
A fascinating woman.
June 16, 2025
I enjoyed this book and liked Frederica’s voice, but was unaware of her reputation. Queen Frederica’s Wikipedia page states that she ended up unpopular for policies and alliances. I think she wrote an interesting book about a period and place I wanted to learn about: Greece and politics of the 20th century.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews