Juana of Castile was mad.  Not angry mad, but crazy mad.  Or at least, she was reputed to be mad.   She has gone down in Spanish history being known as “Juana the Mad” or “Juana La Loca”.  Most people are more familiar with who her parents were:  they were  Isabelle and Ferdinand of Spain.  Or they know about Juana’s younger sister, Catherine of Aragon (also known as Catalina), who was married to Henry VIII of England.

Juana is the subject of the historical fiction novel, The Last Queen: A Novel by  C.W. Gortner. 

This was July’s book for the Historical Fiction book club on facebook (hosted by the Literate Housewife) for the “Queens of Summer” program.  I had first heard of Juana the Mad  in the book “Doomed Queens” by Kris Waldherr (I mention this book, and Juana, briefly in this 1/13/09 post here). 

When I first heard about Juana the Mad, it intrigued me that in an age of arranged and loveless marriages between royal families, Juana and her betrothed Philip of Habsburg were instantly attracted to each other in spite of their marriage being an arranged one.

C.W. Gortner covers this aspect of Juana’s life very well.  In his telling of her story (which is done in the first person narrative), Juana’s passion for Philip continues through their marriage, even though it developed in a love/hate relationship.    This was partly due to Philip’s infidelities, but also due to all of the political intrigue that went on during that time.  What marriage would not be strained under these circumstances?   However, it lasted only ten years due to Philip dying young, and Juana went on to survive for several more years, living to be 75 years old.

Gortner paints Juana as a very strong-willed woman– if she had been meek and submissive, I am sure that there would not have been all the conflict between herself, Philip, and even her parents.  Here is a passage in “The Last Queen”:

“My hands clenched in my lap.  I wished I could pretend I didn’t believe it.  But I did believe it.  It had been there all the time:  his arrogance and lust for power, his weakness and thwarted rage.  He had played a treacherous game even as my mother lay dying, my father fought a bloody war in Naples and I struggled for my place in a world he’d torn apart.  This was the man he was.  This was the husband I was bound to”.

As for Juana’s supposed madness, Gortner does not deal with this in a heavy-handed, over-wrought way.  We are allowed to see how others percieve Juana.  In addition, we see  her inner thoughts and can deduce for ourselves whether Juana is having moments of insanity or not.

This novel is not just about Juana and Philip, but also the personal and political relationships she had with her parents and her siblings (especially Catalina of Aragon).

I felt the book’s climax was reached when Philip died, but the book goes on for a little bit longer, stopping soon after Philip’s death.  I appreciated the factual afterword to the book, which briefly filled in the many years that remained of Juana’s life and reign. 

It does seem that C.W. Gortner did extensive research while writing this book.  I think one thing I’d change is the cover (seen above) of the trade paperback; I’d have preferred a portrait of Juana, perhaps.  It would also have been nice to have a family tree.  A map is provided of Spain and Europe of the novel’s era, which helped me understand the different regions of Spain– Castile, Aragon, and so on.  Overall, I would recommend this book, especially if you like historical fiction.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, August 18th, 2009 at 4:40 PM and is filed under authors, book review, books, history. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.