Charlotte Bronte

Rebecca Fraser is a writer and broadcaster whose work includes a biography of Charlotte Brontë which examines her life in the context of contemporary attitudes to women. President of the Brontë Society for many years, she wrote the introductions to the Everyman editions of Shirley and The Professor and is a contributor to the BBC History website. Her most recent book, A People’s History of Britain, is a highly readable account of British history. It has been described as ‘an elegantly written, impressively well-informed single-volume history of how England was governed during the past 2000 years.’

'If men could see us as we really are, they would be amazed', wrote Charlotte Brontë, the outwardly conventional parson's daughter who had rarely met any men beyond those of the church or classroom by the time Jane Eyre was published in 1847. 
 
From the landscape of the Yorkshire moors, an appalling childhood and a family decimated by consumption, Jane Eyre came as an instant literary sensation. It also brought Charlotte Brontë the notoriety that was to remain with her for the rest of her short and tragic life. 
 
Elizabeth Gaskell, Charlotte's first biographer, attempted to clear Charlotte of the charges of passionate immorality that were levelled at a woman author - and an unmarried one at that. Rebecca Fraser, 130 years later, placed Charlotte's life within the perceptual framework of contemporary attitudes to women. Her biography is an invaluable contribution to Brontë scholarship, which shares her admiration for a woman prepared to stand out against some of the cruelest Victorian ideas about her sex.

A People's History Of Britain

A dazzling one-volume history of Britain, both narrative and anecdotal.

No family in the English-speaking world should be without this stupendous work

At a time when too little history is taught in schools and dubious history presented on TV, Rebecca Fraser has blown a tremendous blast of traditional British history... All will learn from it

A reference book that will see every history student through school and university

An elegantly written, impressively well-informed single-volume history of how England was governed during the past 2000 years. It should be prescribed reading for all politicians

Fraser has put grown-up history back on the national agenda

Rebecca Fraser has worked as a researcher, publisher's editor and journalist, and has written for many publications including Tatler, Vogue, The Times and the Spectator.  She has also illustrated two children's books, King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table and Robin Hood.  She is married and has three daughters.  Her first book, a biography of Charlotte Brontë, was very well received, and she has recently become President of the Brontë Society.

Combining compelling narrative history with helpful chronology, A People's History of Britain tells the story - from the Romans to the present day - of the small northern islands off the coast of Europe which became the world's largest empire. Full of kings, queens and battles and the heroic individuals who created turning points in history, it is packed with anecdotes about British scientists, explorers, soldiers, traders, writers and artists.

Rebecca Fraser

Captivating, scholarly and addictively readable… Rebecca Fraser has the rare gift of being able to marshal and communicate a mountainous quantity of often original research in such a deft and elegant manner that it never becomes indigestible or irrelevant. [...] When a sidestep outside her rigorous chronological account is required, she executes it nimbly, without breaking her stride. If she reaches a period of scanty evidence, she admits it, and her suggestions carry the conviction of expertise. Everything is rooted in provable fact, much of it new

Rebecca Fraser tells this familiar story with wonderful immediacy; the Winslows come across not as strange characters from the distant past, but as real people with passions and anxieties familiar to us all

It is engagingly written and often compelling. There is an eye for memorable detail… The later account of “King Philip’s war” is both graphic and gripping… The author is a careful researcher, fair and level-headed. She is also an excellent painter of characters; in judging them, she looks as their deeds with contemporary mores in mind… Even if the Mayflower shelf is a crowded one, this is a book that deserves its place on it

[Fraser] has threaded the important historiographical innovations seamlessly into her text, paying more attention than hitherto to the experiences of early colonial women, and drawing on the lessons of ethno-history in her portrayal of Indian tribes... A brilliant combination of synthesis and original research arriving in good time for the celebration of the quincentenary of the Mayflower

Fascinating… Rebecca Fraser commands a sprawling canvas, beginning in 1595 with the birth of Edward Winslow and ending in 1704 with the death of Peregrine White… Edward Winslow’s excitement at arriving in Leiden, with its free-thinking university, is vividly captured. So, too, are the perils of the Mayflower’s voyage… There is also a rich sense of the enormous possibilities offered by the New World… This is a thrilling story, admirably told

Fraser is an experienced, sensitive biographer... [She] has clearly set her sights on addressing an audience of intelligent, curious, lay people. She has written with an awareness of the powerful cultural heritage the colonial Puritans created in New England and occasionally alludes to nineteenth-century commentators on them. It is a measure of her success that, after a lifetime of teaching and writing about American history, I found her story illuminating points I had never before fully appreciated.

An intimate view of colonial life, an approachable companion to more forbidding scholarly studies

The Mayflower Generation makes a convincing case that the Winslows, father and son, played as important a role in New England’s development as the better-known William Bradford and John Winthrop

Fraser’s smooth storytelling provides a revealing look into the development of the [Plymouth] colony, the rise of the Massachusetts Bay Company, and the different outlooks on the community and the lure of land. The story of the Winslows is an effective way to experience the emotions and fears of the small band who dauntlessly sailed off to the New World

Epic in scope and pacing, this account of survival feels intimate... The author's inclusion of indigenous history along with the struggles of women pilgrims and their importance to the community's success is both appreciated and necessary

Renowned historian Fraser brings us yet another superbly written and enthralling read... she excels at showing howlandscape, religion, and politics can irreversibly transform a family and a community. Highly recommended

Rebecca Fraser has written a superb account of the first two generations of the Winslow family of the Mayflower. Fraser’s extensive research has shed new light on this interesting family and allied families. This book stands as a significant contribution to the already well documented field of Pilgrim history ... a must read for those interested in the unique beginnings of America

Cynthia Hagar Krusell, Historian and Author of The Winslows of Careswell in Marshfield

Rebecca Fraser’s exquisitely researched book seems to offer something new to learn – and wonder over – on every page, from the warm, mutually admiring friendships between some Puritans and Native Americans to the near-apocalyptic brutality of King Philip’s War, and other campaigns. The Pilgrims believed that ‘the world could begin afresh in America,’ this gifted historian writes. As, eventually, it did. Deftly, indelibly, Fraser shows us the human cost

Penelope Rowlands, Journalist and Author of Aaron Burr's Second Act

The author puts the reader into the period with a front-row seat as the story unfolds and captures the reader. It’s a must-read for anyone interested in the Edward Winslow family and many of his contemporaries that surrounded Winslow in England, the Netherlands and came with him to New England. Fraser’s attention to historical detail is excellent and enhances this riveting book!

Judith H. Swan, Former Governor General, General Society of Mayflower Descendants

A well written and far ranging perspective on the Pilgrims and seventeenth century New England by a noted student of English history

Francis J. Bremer, Coordinator, New England Beginnings and Author of Lay Empowerment and the Development of Puritanism

The Winslow Family and the Fight for the New World

A Times History Book of the Year 
 
The voyage of the Mayflower is one of the seminal events in world history. But the story did not end with her arrival on the frozen coast of New England in 1620. In an epic history, Rebecca Fraser relates one ordinary family’s extraordinary response to the challenges of life in America. Despite the intense physical trials of living in the New World, Edward Winslow found America exotic and enticing. His remarkable friendship with Massasoit, the King of the Wampanoags, is part of the legend of Thanksgiving. Yet, fifty years later, Edward’s son Josiah was commanding the New England militias against Massasoit’s son in King Philip’s War. A fast-paced intensely human portrait, The Mayflower Generation reveals the contradictions between generations as they made the painful decisions that determined the future of America.

Rebecca Fraser

Praise for The Mayflower Generation

Captivating, scholarly and addictively readable… Rebecca Fraser has the rare gift of being able to marshal and communicate a mountainous quantity of often original research in such a deft and elegant m ...

Rebecca Fraser tells this familiar story with wonderful immediacy; the Winslows come across not as strange characters from the distant past, but as real people with passions and anxieties familiar to us al ...

It is engagingly written and often compelling. There is an eye for memorable detail… The later account of “King Philip’s war” is both graphic and gripping… The author is a careful researcher, fa ...

Captivating, scholarly and addictively readable… Rebecca Fraser has the rare gift of being able to marshal and communicate a mountainous quantity of often original research in such a deft and elegant m ...

Rebecca Fraser tells this familiar story with wonderful immediacy; the Winslows come across not as strange characters from the distant past, but as real people with passions and anxieties familiar to us al ...

It is engagingly written and often compelling. There is an eye for memorable detail… The later account of “King Philip’s war” is both graphic and gripping… The author is a careful researcher, fa ...

Captivating, scholarly and addictively readable… Rebecca Fraser has the rare gift of being able to marshal and communicate a mountainous quantity of often original research in such a deft and elegant m ...

Rebecca Fraser tells this familiar story with wonderful immediacy; the Winslows come across not as strange characters from the distant past, but as real people with passions and anxieties familiar to us al ...

It is engagingly written and often compelling. There is an eye for memorable detail… The later account of “King Philip’s war” is both graphic and gripping… The author is a careful researcher, fa ...

Books by Rebecca Fraser

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