A Passion for Government

Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough, was a woman with a "passion for government": a compulsion to wield power not only in her own family but in public affairs as well. The first complete scholarly biography of the Duchess, this book makes full use of recently available manuscript sources to tell the colorful story of a woman at the center of power, whose life spanned more than eighty years from the Restoration to the fall of Walpole. Harris sets Sarah's life and personal relationships in the context of her time, drawing a vivid portrait of a woman whose character and life are as fascinating and contentious today as they were to her contemporaries.

"Harris's meticulously researched biography expands considerably the boundaries of a discussion about this fascinating and complex woman."--Eighteenth-Century Studies
"Unlike earlier biographies of the duchess that tend to focus exclusively on the friendship with Anne, A Passion for Government covers Sarah's life as a whole....A Passion for Government is well-researched, well-argued, and well-written and provides numerous insights to the politics of the Augustan Age."--History: Reviews of New Books
"Among the most rewarding segments of the work are those relating to power and influence exercised at court and within ministerial circles."--American Historical Review "Both entertaining and scholarly."--The Sunday Telegraph
"This detailed biography of the most powerful Englishwomen of her time is a model of careful scholarship and suspended judgments."--The Historian