In his own way Leicester was as mysterious a person as the Queen. His influence on her, from the beginning of her reign until his death in 1588, was constant and incalculable - greater than that of anyone else save Burleigh - though he was generally unpopular among his fellow courtiers, detested by the populace as a whole, and lampooned by the writers of the day. Leicester's complex character, his lavish entertaining, his encouragement of the arts, his day-by-day activities - as courtier, Master of the Queen's Horse, Chancellor of Oxford, leader of the English forces in the war of the Netherlands against Spain - are all brought vividly to life. First published in 1961.

Elizabeth Jenkins was educated at St Christopher School, Letchworth, and Newnham College, Cambridge. A distinguished novelist, historian and biographer she was awarded the Femina Vie Heureuse Prize in 1934 for her novel HARRIET, and she received the OBE in 1981.