Agnes Strickland

Agnes Strickland was an English historical writer and poet born in 1796. She is remembered above all for Lives of the Queens of England, a widely read series published in multiple volumes during the 1840s, written with help from her sister Elisabeth. The books drew on letters, memoirs, and other original material, and they made her one of the best-known women historians of the Victorian period.

She came from a notably literary family, with several sisters who also became writers. Strickland began publishing early, but it was her gift for turning the lives of royal women into vivid, accessible narrative that won her a large audience. Alongside her work on queens, she also wrote biographies of other royal and historical figures.

Although modern historians sometimes find her work more romantic and dramatic than academic history today, her books played a major part in shaping popular interest in Britain’s past. She died in 1874, leaving behind a body of writing that stayed in print for generations.