Noble Blood - Bonus Episode: Dana Schwartz on Significant Others

Episode Date: December 19, 2022

Bonus special episode! Dana Schwartz guests on Significant Others, a narrated, nonfiction podcast about folks just beyond the spotlight of history, hosted by Liza Powel O’Brien. Each episode tells the story of a talented, difficult and little-known individual who altered the destiny of their better-known partner, child, sibling, or friend, and impacted the world they left behind.  --  Liza is joined by Dana Schwartz, host of Noble Blood, which explores the stories of the world’s most fascinating nobles. Today, Dana takes us on a crash course through the complicated dynamics of royal marriages and answers our burning questions! What set Catherine the Great apart? Did Anne Boleyn play her cards right? And who was the first appointed royal spouse that was male? Turns out that relationships aren't so easy when your nation depends on their success. Who knew? Want to support Significant Others? Rate and review wherever you listen to your podcasts and keep sending suggestions of Significant Others you’d like to hear about our way at [e-mail]! And support Noble Blood: — Bonus episodes, stickers, and scripts on Patreon — Merch! — Order Dana's book, 'Anatomy: A Love Story' and pre-order its sequel 'Immortality: A Love Story'See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an I-heart podcast. Guaranteed Human. What's up, everyone? I'm Ago Vodam. My next guest, it's Will Ferrell. Woo, woo, woo, woo. My dad gave me the best advice ever. He goes, just give it a shot.

But if you ever reach a point where you're banging your head against the wall and it doesn't feel fun anymore, it's okay to quit. If you saw it written down, it would not be an inspiration. It would not be on a calendar of, you know, The cat just hang in there. Yeah, it would not be. Right, it wouldn't be that. There's a lot of luck. Listen to Thanks, Dad, on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Hey, guys, this is Dana Schwartz. You probably notice this is not a normal episode of Noble Blood. And that's because I was a guest on the podcast, Significant Others, hosted by the incredibly fun and charming Liza Paulo, Brian. We just had a blast talking about, well, significant others in history. famous spouses of monarchs and nobles, which has been a topic that we've covered on this show, but it was just so fun to be able to chat about it casually with Liza. So I really hope you enjoy this conversation as much as I did. And of course, your regular episode will be coming Tuesday. Welcome back to significant others. I'm Liza Powell O'Brien. And just because I'm deep in research for season two doesn't mean we have to stop bringing you stories of interesting plus ones. In the

first of these bonus episodes, Stacey Schiff and I talked about her new book, The Revolutionary, which is all about Samuel Adams and his wildly underreported role in the birth of America. So check that one out if you haven't already. And as royal relationships are very much in the media these days, even more than usual, I thought it would be interesting to delve a little bit into the idea of a royal marriage in general, since there really isn't anything else like it. and to talk about a few of the more significant examples of what that kind of a marriage can look like. So I reached out to the absolute queen, no pun intended, of such information, historian, author, and host of the delightful podcast Noble Blood, Dana Schwartz.

Dana, thank you so much for talking with us today. For anyone who's listening who might not already be familiar with your podcast, could you tell us a little bit about it? Yeah, absolutely. It's a scripted podcast where I research and write episodes, every episode exploring sort of a lesser-known story from the lives of royals throughout history. Some are sort of lesser-known stories or aspects about really famous people like Marie Antoinette or Anne Boleyn. But I also try to capture, you know, fascinating stories about people that maybe American listeners might not have even heard about. Like I just recorded an episode about this. Portuguese princess named Annes de Castro, queen, actually, but sort of her gruesome and tragic death. So, yeah, a lot of perhaps surprising amount of royal stories and in gruesome deaths, but that's part of the fun. It's so addictive, your podcast. I have to really, honestly, it's almost problematic because I'll start listening to them, and then I realize four hours have gone by, and I've done, I've attended to no children. I've cooked no meals. So you have to limit your intake.

Thank you very much. The highest phrase. So in this podcast, we focus on intimate relationships. Sometimes parents or friends of historical figures. Usually it's a spouse. That's because I've always been really personally fascinated by intense one-on-one relationships, especially marriages. And one of the things I find especially interesting in marriages is power dynamics and how they differ. And when it comes to royal marriages, which is sort of falling under your umbrella of expertise, I find that to be so specific because there's such an inherent power imbalance baked in from the beginning. Absolutely. And I have just observed myself that there's a whole range of responses that humans throughout history have had to this condition of being put in the position of being a royal spouse.

And, you know, everything from totally compliant to completely revolutionary. And I thought you might be the best person to walk us through some of those examples. So I'm just wondering if you can, whatever comes to you in response to that idea of like, what are the different ways that this kind of relationship has played out? Absolutely. I think the power dynamic that you're pointing out is so important when we're talking about royal marriages. One, because traditionally, let's say, for several hundred years, it would be a man in charge.

of any marriage, you know, any family relationship. And then to give someone the power of, you know, absolute rule, God's vessel on earth, that power sort of takes on an even bigger light. I think when we're talking about royal wives, the first thing that pops into most people's heads is King Henry VIII and his six wives. And what a fascinating saga that is

because of the way he went from woman to woman. And I think in the stories, these women sort of are unfortunately always sort of seen in response to him. And I think it's been a modern movement like in the musical six to try to reclaim their own agency and sort of the narrative potential of them. I mean, you think of someone like Henry the eighth's first wife, Catherine of Aragon, who was his loyal wife at his side for 20 plus years. I mean, this is a woman who was a princess in her own right. the daughter of two of the most important monarchs in Europe, the aunt of the Holy Roman Emperor, like the most connected and powerful individual

a woman can be at this time, really, right? Like, she's the Queen of England. Her parents are a king and a queen. Her family is massively powerful throughout Europe. Her nephew at a certain point, sacks the Vatican, has the Vatican under his control. She has all the mechanisms of power. And yet, because this woman, even though she's been a loyal, loving wife for 20 plus years, even though the kingdom loves her, you know, she's seen as this pious woman, because she hasn't provided Henry with a son, he does everything in his power to dispose of her.

And he does. I mean, even though, again, like the stopgaps in place to prevent a man just from saying, I don't want to be married to you anymore at this point are, I mean, he does. He's the head of the church and she's a subject. A subject. But they're Catholic, right? Like, he can't divorce. He will literally separate from the Catholic Church, become excommunicated, start the Church of England. He will do everything in his power to undermine their marriage.

And she has, she plays all of her cards and it doesn't work. Like that, I think the tragedy of that is so emblematic of the way that a man has power over his wife in certain ways. But then, and again, not to monologue and ramble because this is clearly... I'm already like, give me the popcorn. I'm ready to go. You put a microphone in front of me and I start, you know. I mean, and then you have a situation like Catherine the Great, who it's this very strange, different dynamic where Catherine the Great is a German princess from a lowborn family

is sort of brought in to marry the heir to the Russian throne because they think she's sort of going to be easily controlled. Again, she has none of the entrenched political power that someone like Catherine Bergen would have had. But over the course of her marriage to Peter, Catherine ingratiates herself to the Russian people, converts to Russian orthodoxy in a way that like the people fall in love with, learns the Russian language. There's a story about her. She catches ill very early on in her marriage. And the story, and she's bedridden. And the story that sort of spreads, that feeds into her legend, is that she was up at night pacing on the cold floor, studying Russian. And that's why people like fall in love with her. And her husband is such an ineffective

bad emperor in so many ways that six months into his reign, even though she wasn't Russian born, even though she wasn't heir to the throne, even though she really has no claim to the Russian throne in any legitimate way, we might imagine through lineage, she rallies the armies behind her, the people behind her, the church behind her, and overthrows her own husband. So she was ambitious. So it's sort of like there are these, Catherine Varagon, I don't know how ambitious she might have been. And Belin is always predate and pritchet is very, very ambitious. Right? And I don't, again, I don't know so much myth has been made about all of Henry's, well, Henry himself and all of his wives. And I don't know, I sort of love the idea of Anne Boleyn as like

a, you know, a schemer. I don't know how much it was right place, right time, you know. I mean, it's she, she had a very limited opportunity, right? It's like her family is saying, like, do this thing. This is the one thing you're supposed to do. This is how to advance as a woman. I mean, in the 1500s, advancing as a woman was a big prospect. Yeah. Yeah. And then not getting bedded. And if the king wants you, you have fewer cards to play than maybe people think.

And I, my Ann Bolin hot take is I think she played her cards magnificently. And if she had happened to have a son, she would have been fine. Right. And because she didn't. Yeah. Yeah, these things. These things haven't. But like, it was an impossible situation, right?

And then the patriarchy does that to us. So when was the first appointed royal spouse who was male? Oh, gosh. I guess it depends on if we're going to count Empress Matilda. So there's, are you watching the new Game of Thrones by chance? I'm not. Okay. So for people who are watching, House the Dragon, the character,

Reneira, like the young princess who is claiming queen, is sort of based on this figure named Empress Matilda, who, depending on who you ask, counts or doesn't count as a monarch of England. So she was the daughter of King Henry I. His only legitimate son, William, died in a ship disaster, a ship crashed against some rocks. And so her father said, my daughter, Matilda, is my heir. Of course, then her father dies. And a lot of people in 1,100 England say, no, we do not. I know we swore for fealty to her when your father is alive, but your father is not alive anymore. And so there becomes a civil war in England known as the anarchy. And her nephew, cousin, nephew, I'm going to get this wrong. And so I hope no one angrily corrects me. A relative, either a cousin or a cousin or nephew, Stephen, is sort of the counter faction who then claims power. But Matilda, who was fighting in this civil war for her right to the throne, had her husband, Jeffrey, who was focused on conquering Normandy, which was also considered part of the English crowns power at that time.

So that's sort of an interesting husband. Fascinating. There are other few sort of interesting dynamics where a wife has technically higher claim at a given time, like Mary Queen of Scots was married to a prince of France, who then became the King of France. But at the time that they were married, she was the Queen of Scotland. Her mother was ruling in her stead and her half-brother was sort of ruling while she was in France. But she was the independent queen of a country married to the Default France. And that had... its own interesting political dynamics because being but unfortunately as mary queen of scots learned like her marriages only ever really diminished her power um she she makes the terrible decision to marry

this man named lord darnley who she had been charmed by but was a was a terrible match he dies in mysterious uh an explosion that was and then he was found strangled like there was a murder attempt because he was awful. And Mary Queen of Scotch was sort of like, oh, no, my husband died. That's so sad. I'm, you know, I'll definitely look into what happened. But the people of Scotland at the time see that and don't like that that's her reaction. And then she marries in her third marriage, the man who was implicated in her second husband's death, which the people of Scotland absolutely hate. And some historians say she didn't have a choice in that matter, that, you know, he raped and kidnapped her. Some say that, you know, she just made a terrible calculation. But either way,

those were two matches that ultimately diminished her power. And someone like her cousin, Elizabeth I of England, realized that she's already queen. Marrying a man is only going to compromise her. Compromise her power. Thank you. Exactly. And so is she the only example? She's the most obvious example of an unmarried female monarch. Is there other, is there anyone else who did that? In England, no, I'm sure around the world there are, and I just off the top of my head, can't recall. Absolutely several African monarchs and queens. But in England, no, Queen Elizabeth made the calculation of ruling as a virgin queen. But there's a benefit of that, right, which is that she doesn't have to submit to a man, but the cost of that is it's the end of the Tudor dynasty

because she doesn't have heirs. And at the end of the day, the purpose of a of a monarchy is to create your dynasty, have it keep going, create heirs. And I think part of the problem also, especially in the 1500s, if we're talking about Elizabeth I first, childbirth is a very dangerous prospect. Sure. So it's, it's very much a bodily risk. That's right. So to put the monarch through that kind of a trial from which what percentage of women didn't, you know, emerge successfully at 30 percent, you know. Sure, yeah. I'm totally making that. And I'm like that, that sounds right. I don't know at the top of my head, but it's very, it's dangerous, right? You're putting the monarch in a very vulnerable position. Right. In terms of the selection process,

for lack of a better phrase, for these royal partners. You know, we know sort of in pop culture what the story is about, you know, the current royal family in England or the most recent generation. But was there, like, was it selected by the ruling monarch? Was there a council? Was it the family? Was it all of the above? How did that work?

The family in most cases, because you are absolutely correct, that these are not decisions very often made for love. are strategic decisions. Right. The role of marriage for a lot of, you know, Western history from a certain, you know, from at least as long as we have like the English monarchy recorded, it was to secure alliances. It was to secure political or religious alliances to combine land. Dowries were important.

And so, yeah, love was sort of a something reserved for poor people, I suppose. Right. Like almost a luxury that the monarchy couldn't afford, right? Yeah. And also I think it was very much understood, especially in France at the time, royal mistress was an official position. Right. With a salary and apartments that you lived in. Yeah, that's the ticket. Right. So it was almost akin to, I mean, it wasn't marriage, obviously because marriage was considered this very political, legal, religious institution. But it was almost a marriage. of sorts because by appointing someone your royal mistress, they have an official position in your

life. And so I think in France, it was very much understood that your wife is to fulfill this certain role and your mistress is to fulfill another role. And I actually think, now you've gotten me on my high horse, this is sort of a pet subject of mine. It was to Marie Antoinette's detriment that her husband never did take a mistress. Her husband, Louis, the 16th was sort of awkward. It took them seven years to consummate their marriage. He was not a very sexual person. I think sometimes people like to think, well, was he gay? And I think, no, I think more likely he just was maybe closer to asexual. He just wasn't very sexual. And Marie Antoinette, because he never had an official royal mistress to sort of defer court

attention and gossip and the more frivolous aspects of courtly life, Marie Antoinette was in this unfortunate position of being forced to do both, where she was both the one that everyone looked to for fashion and style and gossip, but also at the same time she was expected to be, you know, the royal mother and the queen and honor that position with the dignity they expected. There's a famous example of a portrait that was painted in 1783 of Marie Antoinette in a simple muslin gown, like a Shemis style gown, that was meant to evoke farm simplicity.

She was doing 1780s Cottage Corps. And that was very fashionable at the time for rich people to sort of play at simplicity, you know, the way I think people kind of do on TikTok today, like baking bread. But at the time, this portrait was so scandalous that it was pulled from display because the first response was that it was too sexual,

that it looked like she was in her undergarments, that it was so casual. And that as a queen, she, you know, she was dishonoring the position as queen, the status, the title, the status that she held. She was sullying herself with normalcy. Selling, well, sulling the position of queen. And also, you know, imagine she's trying to put the French silk merchants

out of business by not wearing a silk gown. And so it was this sort of horrible thing where it backfired on every count where I think common people in France saw her as being condescending, you know, that's sort of like slumming it where they're like, what are you doing? You know, the way that I think if we saw, you know, a celebrity today making rice and beans and being like, oh, I love eating or whatever, you know, some like very casual food where you're like, what? Like, that's not what you are.

But then the rich people were like, you are selling your position as queen. And so it fully backfired on every account. Where did this line up with her farm that she famously created behind Versailles? We are exactly there. You absolutely nailed it. She had people also make fun of this a lot. She had this thing called the Queen's Hamlet, which was a working, it was a model farm, but it was a working dairy farm where she went to escape because Versailles was like being in a fishbowl. You are always watched and every step from the order in which you get dressed in the morning to your meals is watched and perfectly choreographed.

And so, of course, like you imagine, like she just wanted like a breather, like a minute just to like be by herself and just hang out. And this was actually very common in the late 1700s of nobles building these sort of faux farms to evoke a domestic simplicity. Homey, exactly. So, yeah, she had a fake working farm, and she was sort of dress up like a, you know, in more casual clothes and just spend time with her children, which was also considered a very weird thing she did. Right. It was like, why are you spending all this time parenting your children? Don't you know, you can pay people to parent your children for you? That echoes with Lady Diana and her interests also.

You said something that I have been very curious about since I listened to your episode on The Mad King, King George III. We're talking about how he, whatever his affliction was, was sort of at bay for many years. And he became ill later in his life. But there was a long period of time where he was sort of managing the royal business fairly well. And he had all these siblings who were sort of crazy. I mean, they were all acting insane and nobody was marrying who they were supposed to marry. And I was just thinking about, like, you know, I don't hear much just as a layperson, and I don't know how big an area of scholarship it is. But of these royals who, you know, were with this incredibly strict and conventional idea of marriage and partnership in that way, like, what of the, you know, the queer royals through history?

Like, do we know anything about any of them? And, you know, I'm sure their fate was complicated. if it was recorded at all. But do you know anything about any of that? Yeah, we have a few interesting stories. So there was King Edward II of England. And this is now in the late 1200s. And there was a man, I mean, because so much of it isn't recorded

the way that I think modern sources would want it to be recorded. And I think these things are complicated because I don't think these, the characters, the people at the time wouldn't have called themselves gay or queer that vocabulary didn't exist. And so I, as like an untrained historian, I'm always, like, wary to put these labels on people. Sure. But King Edward II of England, who was, you know,

King of England, this is late 1,200s, early 1300s, had a favorite Pierce Gaviston, who sort of had exclusive access to the king. It was heavily implied. This was a romantic relationship. I mean, I would argue that it absolutely is romantic. if not sexual, but medieval chronicler. So even at the time people were writing

that this relationship is sexual, Christopher Marlow, the playwright, sort of a contemporary of Shakespeare, basically says as much in the play, Edward II. And some modern historians, I think, disagree on the extent of the sexual relationship. But he was very much his favorite, and it's a tragic story.

I mean, basically that other nobles don't like this favoritism. and they retaliate against him and they retaliate against Pierce and like this is a time when even being king could only go so far at certain points because again marriage at this time

is not about happiness it's about securing this religious political alliance and having heirs and a lover of the same sex in every I think it was sort of a sometimes a don't ask don't tell policy of certain monarchs

And sometimes it really was politically damaging. I mean, part of what led to Marie Antoinette's downfall was the incredible amount of political propaganda against her, which were cartoons of her engaged in sexual, lesbian acts with her closest ladies in waiting. And so I think it is a challenge of historians today to sort of tease out when these relationships were sexual, because obviously gay people existed, because people existed.

That's right. But yeah, the sources are tricky. And I think because for so much of European history, Christianity was so deeply ingrained in society and culture. Yeah, exactly. So queer relationships were both powerful tools of propaganda because accusing some of it, someone of it was obviously incredibly damaging, but also something that someone would have kept a secret. You also have that great episode on the person whose name I am not going to remember. the French trans. Yes, exactly, which is such a great story.

It's so interesting to untangle it. And I won't go into the whole story, but it is I like to think a person who chose of her own free will to live as a woman. And even though we wouldn't have had, or they wouldn't have had the vocabulary to call themselves trans, I think it's so interesting to remind people

that, no, for hundreds of years, People made these decisions. Right. What's up, everyone? I'm Ego Wodom. My next guest, you know from Step Brothers Anchorman, Saturday Night Live, and the Big Money Players Network. It's Will Ferrell. Woo.

Woo. My dad gave me the best advice ever. I went and had lunch with them one day. And I was like, and Dad, I think I want to really give this a shot. I don't know what that means, but I just know the groundlings. I'm working my way up through. And I know it's a place they come look for up and coming. look for up and coming talent.

He said, if it was based solely on talent, I wouldn't worry about you, which is really sweet. Yeah. He goes, but there's so much luck involved. And he's like, just give it a shot. He goes, but if you ever reach a point where you're banging your head against the wall and it doesn't feel fun anymore, it's okay to quit. If you saw it written down, it would not be an inspiration. It would not be on a calendar of, you know, the cat. Just hang in there.

Yeah, it would not be. Right, it wouldn't be that. There's a lot of luck. Listen to Thanks, Dad, on the IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. What's up, everyone? I'm Ago Wodom. My next guest, you know from Step Brothers Anchorman, Saturday Night Live and the Big Money Players Network. It's Will Ferrell.

Woo, woo, woo, woo, woo. My dad gave me the best advice ever. I went and had lunch with them one day. I was like, and dad, I think I want to really give this a shot. I don't know what that means, but I just know the groundlings. I'm working my way up through, and I know it's a place that come look for up and coming talent. He said, if it was based solely on talent, I wouldn't worry about you, which is really sweet. Yeah.

He goes, but there's so much luck involved. And he's like, just give it a shot. He goes, but if you ever reach a point where you're banging your head against the wall and it doesn't feel fun anymore, it's okay to quit. If you saw it written down, it would not be an inspiration. It would not be on a calendar of, you know, the cat. Just hang in there. Yeah, it would not be. Right, it wouldn't be that.

There's a lot of luck. Listen to Thanks Dad on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Is there a time that you can peg it to in terms of when, I don't remember when the sort of modern sensibility about what romantic love is and how it plays. into marriage. I can't remember when that sort of entered the society in the Western world anyway. But in the sense of royal marriages, I don't think they are any more meant to be about international alliances, at least again in Europe or Western Europe. And yet they still have that. Now their success rate is just through the roof. We went away with that and they're, they're, that all works perfectly. We fixed all the problems. Yeah. Yeah. But was there a moment where it shifted? I think one of the,

the key moment, at least in my understanding, is the relationship between Queen Victoria and Prince Albert. This was a situation where Victoria fell head over heels in love. And she was devoted to Albert to a fault. I mean, she loved her husband so much that when he died, she spent the rest of her life in mourning. I mean, it's so funny because obviously the Victorian era is so powerful and we imagine her as such a large, I mean, she's tiny. She's like, you know, four foot 10, but a larger than life figure in English history. And she was obsessed with her husband to a degree that I think, like, nowadays people would be jealous of them. I'm like, oh, my God. She hated having children. She, they had, you know, 10 children, and she absolutely hated having children, but she just loved

being intimate with her husband and no one taught her about birth control. So, you know, She was like, say, Lovie. They were... Do what you got to do. You do what you got to do. I mean, she had a... This is a young woman who had a very, very controlled childhood. When she was born, she was the basically heir apparent eventually after her father, after her uncle died.

She was, she's the only legitimate granddaughter of King Charles III. Jesus Christ, King George the Third. King Charles III is right now. He has a lot of... Whatever. She's the only legitimate granddaughter of King George. She is born and she's this precious thing. And so she's raised under this incredibly strict system called the Kensington system

where her mother basically doesn't let her be a person until she actually is literally Queen of England. And so by falling in love and marrying this man, it's sort of her act of rebellion and freedom. She sort of pushes her mother and her mother's advisor out of her. orbit and focuses all of her attention on on Albert and they have an incredibly by all accounts happy marriage and life for the you know for the years they have together does she empower him in an unusual way they they had a partnership really i mean i guess the question is what is it's unusual at all that it was in a late 1800s marriage where the woman had a more important job than

the man absolutely absolutely and probably also relatively rare for a marriage steeped in romantic love to be successful because most people had nothing. And so most people had a very hard life. And so even if they were in love with their spouse, it may not have played out so great, you know, through all the years. Yeah. But I'm, of course, contrasting it to the popular understanding or fantasy about Queen Elizabeth and Prince Phillips' relationship where, you know, from what I can gather and certainly what I imagine. to be true, that it was tough for a man to be second to his female spouse. And I don't know if there's any, you know, if there was any agitating on Albert's part or if the adoration was enough for him.

If it was just, you know, I'm here for you because you're so wonderful to me. And together we will, you know, found many museums to have all these babies and have a great life. I think, you know, it's hard for me to get into these people. people's head, so a lot of this is guesswork. Sure. I think Victoria was so deferential to Albert that he felt okay, you know. And I think it was a little bit harder, weirdly, for Philip, because again, this is like the 1950s, right?

This is like when the idea of masculinity is at its real madman peak. And here's a situation where, you know, under Victoria, she was an empress. This is like, okay, the monarchy is at the height of its actual power. Whereas, like, Queen Elizabeth, like, this is a symbolic. role largely at this point. And so it's, you know, maybe he had less of a inherent deference, reverence. And so I think it might have been a little harder when they got into the argument that they did have where he was like, wait, so my kids aren't going to have my name.

She's like, no, are you? I mean, she's like, she didn't say this. But if it was me, I would have been like, oh, are you effing kidding me? They're going to have like my last name. That's like Queen Victoria's last name. They're kind of your made up German last name. I'm like, what are you talking about? Well, I think that would have gone very well if you would put it like that.

I would have been great to be married time. I would have been like, are you absolutely kidding me? And I have to think that the era of sort of media awareness that they existed in would have made it much more difficult too because he's getting, you know, feedback from everyone about their relationship rather than just managing it privately, which is just a lot harder. Right. he's hearing every comment of someone saying, like,

oh, can you believe this guy walking one step behind his wife? Where also Queen Victoria was so deferential to her husband, where even though she was the queen, like, I mean, she's using a lot of 1800s language and talking about how she, like, worships and obeys her husband. And so I feel like that he would have been okay with that. She covered it. She covered it because this is, again, she is so obsequious

and deferential to him that it would have been hard for him to get mad where it's like, Queen Elizabeth, this is a sort of trickier situation just as the monarchy is at this weird modernizing crux, like feminism and masculinity and the patriarchy is changing

in the 20th century. I feel like we can't not talk about Wallace Simpson just a little teeny bit. And I think most people probably know exactly who Wallace Simpson is, but just in case they missed it, can you do it? a quick overview of that? Sure. King George V had two sons and the oldest son obviously is in line to

inherit the throne and he becomes King Edward VIII but he falls in love with a divorced American actress named Wallace Simpson and as the head of the Church of England, it's against church laws to marry a divorcee if their spouse is still alive. She's a divorce. She's a divorce. with a living spouse. That's big of me. Like, you can't do that. And also for a bunch of other reasons, like he fundamentally was ill-suited to being king.

And he was a Nazi sympathizer, which we won't go into because I'll just get mad. But he abdicates the throne in favor of his younger brother, who becomes George the 6th, who is Queen Elizabeth II's father. And so that's why we have the line we have now. But Wallace Simpson was this,

divorced American woman who scandalized the royal family by falling in love with David, but who took the reginal name King Edward VIII. And yeah, he abdicated the throne. And they, instead of being king and queen, they went with the Duke and Duchess of Windsor. She never got her royal highness, which is sort of like an honorary title because that was sort of them sticking it to her. and they lived sort of the rest of their lives in France, you know, chumming it up with Hitler, thinking, well, maybe if this Hitler chap wants to put us back on the throne,

that would be fun, wouldn't it? Oh, I didn't realize there was that element to that relationship. It was sealed until very recently. This is a sort of thing that the royal family has not publicized, broadcast. But there are, yeah, photographs. And when you have a photograph smiling next to Hitler, it's not a good look. No.

But no, that especially during the Second World War, obviously when Germany was the enemy, the British royal family tried very hard to make sure that it was suppressed that Wallace and David were cozying up or had been cozying up with the Germans.

But yeah, they sort of had this, I think what they characterized as this love story that he was willing to give up the throne for her. But I think for a lot of, other reasons he was ill-suited to being king, and I'm glad he wasn't. Yeah, no kidding. Is there another example of that happening that you know of, of someone falling in love and giving up their seat of power? Well, if we're also talking also about queer, possibly queer monarchs,

there was a queen of Sweden named Queen Christina, who some people argue was lesbian or would have been she favored men's dress she was you know queen of Sweden but resigned for whether it was

religious reasons she refused to marry which was its own scandal then converted to Catholicism secretly and now I think she she's buried in the Vatican and is either the only woman buried in the Vatican or

one of only a few women buried in the Vatican but she's someone who gave up her throne, not for a man, but for a lack of man. I just wanted to add that in the realm of people who are significantly influential, I have to say that your podcast, without it, I don't know that I would have ever thought to do what I'm doing, not that that's any great shakes for the world, but I'm grateful. I'm so grateful that you do what you do, and I feel you're a trailblazer, and I, I, personally have benefited from that. So thank you. Oh my gosh. That is the truly the genuinely

kindest thing anyone has said. I feel very lucky that people let me rant into a microphone about historical figures I find interesting. And I am, I love when that exists more in the world. So I'm very excited for what you're doing. Well, thank you so much. Do you have anything that you want? I know you're working on a couple of books. I don't know if you have anything that you want to plug or promote or send us to. Oh my gosh. That would be great. I have a new book coming out in February called Immortality, a Love Story. And if you're interested in historical royals, I have a few cameos. I have Princess Charlotte of Wales appears, Lord Byron, appears, a few other characters I've talked about on my podcast, but it's available for pre-order now.

That book sounds amazing. Too late for this Christmas, but definitely in time for Valentine's Day. Absolutely. Thank you so much. This is such a pleasure. Thank you so much for listening. And thanks again for to Dana for joining us. If you haven't already, please check out her podcast, Noble Blood, wherever you get your podcasts. I promise you won't be disappointed. We'll continue to release bonus episodes while we work on season two, so be sure to hit the subscribe button. And as always, we welcome any and all suggestions for upcoming episodes. You can email us at significant pod at gmail.com. What's up, everyone? I'm Ago Vodom. My next guest, it's Will Ferrell.

My dad gave me the best advice ever. He goes, just give it a shot. But if you ever reach a point where you're banging your head against the wall and it doesn't feel fun anymore, it's okay to quit. If you saw it written down, it would not be an inspiration. It would not be on a calendar of, you know, the cat. Just hang in there. Yeah, it would not be.

Right, it wouldn't be that. There's a lot of luck. Yeah. Listen to Thanks, Dad, on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. This is an IHeart podcast. Guaranteed human.