
The Scapegoat
The Brilliant Brief Life of the Duke of Buckingham
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Narrated by:
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Lucy Hughes-Hallett
About this listen
From the winner of the Baillie Gifford Prize, an extraordinary history of the meteoric rise and fall of George Villiers, the first Duke of Buckingham.
As King James I’s favorite, Buckingham was also his confidant, gatekeeper, advisor and lover. When Charles I succeeded his father, he was similarly enthralled and made Buckingham his best friend and mentor. A dazzling figure on horseback and a skilful player of the political game, Buckingham rapidly transformed the influence his beauty gave him into immense wealth and power. He became one of the most flamboyant and enigmatic Englishmen at the heart of seventeenth-century royal and political life.
With a novelist’s touch, Lucy Hughes-Hallett transports us into a courtly world of masques and dancing, exquisite clothes, the art of Rubens and Van Dyck, gender-fluidity, same-sex desire, and appallingly rudimentary medicine. Witch hunts coexisted with Descartian rationality and public opinion was becoming a political force. Falling from grace spectacularly, Buckingham came to represent everything that was wrong with the country.
From kidnappings and murder plots to men weeping in Parliament over civil liberties, The Scapegoat navigates love, war-fever and pacifism in a society on the brink of cataclysmic change. In this immersive and authoritative account, Hughes-Hallett summons an era that still resonates today.
©2024 Lucy Hughes-Hallett (P)2024 HarperCollins PublishersListeners also enjoyed...
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- Length: 30 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
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From the darkness of a plagued and war-torn Middle Ages, the Renaissance (we’re told) heralds the dawning of a new world—a halcyon age of art, prosperity, and rebirth. Hogwash! or so says award-winning novelist and historian Ada Palmer. In Inventing the Renaissance, Palmer turns her witty and irreverent eye on the fantasies we’ve told ourselves about Europe’s not-so-golden age, myths she sets right with sharp clarity.
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Completely changed my perspective of Machiavelli
- By Amazon Customer on 04-30-25
By: Ada Palmer
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Crown, Cloak, and Dagger
- The British Monarchy and Secret Intelligence from Victoria to Elizabeth II
- By: Richard J. Aldrich, Rory Cormac
- Narrated by: Liam Gerrard
- Length: 15 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
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The British Royal Family and the intelligence community are two of the most mysterious and mythologized actors of the British State. Crown, Cloak, and Dagger offers a new history of how the two have been inextricably linked from the reign of Queen Victoria to the present.
By: Richard J. Aldrich, and others
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Impossible Monsters
- Dinosaurs, Darwin, and the Battle Between Science and Religion
- By: Michael Taylor
- Narrated by: Michael Langan
- Length: 15 hrs
- Unabridged
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Impossible Monsters reveals the central role of dinosaurs and their discovery in toppling traditional religious authority, and in changing perceptions about the Bible, history, and mankind's place in the world.
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Repetitive and not that interesting
- By Michael on 09-09-24
By: Michael Taylor
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The Bluestockings
- A History of the First Women's Movement
- By: Susannah Gibson
- Narrated by: Fenella Fudge
- Length: 13 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
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In England in the 1700s, a woman who was an intellectual, spoke out, or wrote professionally was considered unnatural. After all, as the wisdom of the era dictated, a clever woman—if there were such a thing—would never make a good wife. But a circle of women called the Bluestockings did something extraordinary: Coming together in glittering salons to discuss and debate as intellectual equals with men, they fought for women to be educated and to have a public role in society. In this intimate and revelatory history, Susannah Gibson delves into the lives of these pioneering women.
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fascinating book almost ruined by the reader
- By braingirl on 08-13-24
By: Susannah Gibson
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The King in the North
- The Life and Times of Oswald of Northumbria
- By: Max Adams
- Narrated by: Hamilton McLeod
- Length: 15 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
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A charismatic leader, a warrior whose prowess in battle earned him the epithet Whiteblade, an exiled prince who returned to claim his birthright, the inspiration for Tolkein's Aragorn: Oswald of Northumbria was the first great English monarch, yet today this legendary figure is all but forgotten. In this panoramic portrait of Dark Age Britain, archaeologist and biographer Max Adams returns the king in the North to his rightful place in history.
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Fascinating
- By Wendy on 02-14-25
By: Max Adams
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The House of Beaufort
- The Bastard Line That Captured the Crown
- By: Nathen Amin
- Narrated by: Graham Mack
- Length: 16 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
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The Wars of the Roses were a tumultuous period in English history, with family fighting family over the greatest prize in the kingdom—the throne of England. But what gave the eventual victor of these brutal and complex wars, Henry Tudor, the right to claim the crown? What made his Beaufort mother the great heiress of medieval England, and how exactly did an illegitimate line come to challenge the English monarchy? This book uncovers the rise of the Beauforts and tracks their fall during the 1460s and 1470s.
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Too many "ashumptions" for me...
- By Vicki Patterson on 12-11-23
By: Nathen Amin
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Rookie Move
- Playing for Keeps, Book 1
- By: Neve Wilder, Riley Hart
- Narrated by: Nick J. Russo
- Length: 7 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
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I’ve had a crush on my brother’s best friend since the moment I laid eyes on him four years ago. Warner Ramsey is 225 pounds of pure hotness, a media darling, and one of the best NFL quarterbacks in the league. Hell, he’s the reason I figured out I’m solidly bi. It was easy to keep my crush under control when I was in college. Now, we play for the same team, and every time he talks smack, I want to shut him up. With my mouth.
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I finished this in one sitting
- By Jess ~ Book Lover on 07-18-22
By: Neve Wilder, and others
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Ancient Christianities
- The First Five Hundred Years
- By: Paula Fredriksen
- Narrated by: Rachel Perry
- Length: 8 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
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The ancient Mediterranean teemed with gods. For centuries, a practical religious pluralism prevailed. How, then, did one particular god come to dominate the politics and piety of the late Roman Empire? In Ancient Christianities, Paula Fredriksen traces the evolution of early Christianity—or rather, of early Christianities—through five centuries of Empire, mapping its pathways from the hills of Judea to the halls of Rome and Constantinople.
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Among the best
- By Jacob Kilgore on 04-17-25
By: Paula Fredriksen
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The Lives and Deaths of the Princesses of Hesse
- The curious destinies of Queen Victoria's granddaughters
- By: Frances Welch
- Narrated by: Jilly Bond
- Length: 9 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
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Drawing on hundreds of previously unseen letters from the sisters as well as from their grandmother Queen Victoria, The Princesses of Hesse takes us on a sweeping journey across the tumultuous landscape of the turn of the century - from the dramas of the Russian Court to the Russian Revolution, and through both World Wars in which they often found themselves on opposing sides.
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Fascinating
- By Franchella on 03-07-25
By: Frances Welch
What listeners say about The Scapegoat
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- A. Zitelli
- 03-06-25
Interesting piece of history
I had very little understanding of this time in history being raised in the United States where one doesn’t learn about the English Civil War or events leading up to it. This book gives a good background of how court life was, how poor decisions on the part of those in charge of a nation ruin lives of many. I’m glad I listened to this and hope others do or read it as well. I also purchased a paper copy to see pictures and more easily re-read some sections.
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- Greg Murphy
- 03-13-25
Perfect
Highly recommended. Enthralling, very human history. Outstanding writing and research. Beautifully read. Sorry it had to end.
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