'Things as are all Forms, & Ceremonys': Ritual and authority in the reign of Queen Anne

Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough, impatient with courtly ritual,
gave Queen Anne grudging praise for her knowledge of protocol:
'She has the greatest memory that ever was, especially for such
things as are all forms, & ceremonys, giving people their due
Ranks at Processions & their proper Places at Balls, &
having the right order at Installments & funerals.'


The detailed records of court rituals held by The National
Archives - including papers related to Anne's coronation, the
state visit she hosted for 'Charles III' of Spain, the funeral of
Prince George, and her own funeral - attest to her close
attention to courtly propriety. This talk explains that her
motives for insisting on proper rituals were not merely personal
and nostalgic but shrewdly political and diplomatic.


James A Winn is William Fairfield Warren Professor of English at
Boston University. His books include Unsuspected Eloquence
(1981), a history of the relations between poetry and music; John
Dryden and His World (1987), a prize-winning biography; and The
Poetry of War (2008).


There is a small degree of interference in the audio quality of
this live recording.