Antonia Fraser is the author of many widely acclaimed historical works, including the biographies Mary, Queen of Scots (a 40th anniversary edition was published in May 2009), Cromwell: Our Chief of Men, King Charles II and The Gunpowder Plot (CWA Non-Fiction Gold Dagger; St Louis Literary Award). She has written five highly praised books which focus on women in history, The Weaker Vessel: Women’s Lot in Seventeenth Century Britain (Wolfson Award for History, 1984), The Warrior Queens: Boadecia’s Chariot, The Six Wives of Henry VIII, Marie Antoinette: The Journey (Franco-British Literary Prize 2001), which was made into a film by Sofia Coppola in 2006 and most recently Love and Louis XIV: The Women in the Life of the Sun King. She was awarded the Norton Medlicott Medal by the Historical Association in 2000. Antonia Fraser was made DBE in 2011 for her services to literature.
Her most recent book is Must You Go?, celebrating her life with Harold Pinter, who died on Christmas Eve 2008. She lives in London.
Books in order of publication:
Non-fiction works
Mary Queen of Scots (1969).
Reissued, Phoenix paperback, 2001.
40th anniversary edition, reissued Orion paperback, 7 May 2009.
Dolls (1963)
A History of Toys (1966)
Cromwell, Our Chief of Men (1973);
Also published as Cromwell: The Lord Protector.
King James VI and I (1974)
The Lives of the Kings and Queens of England (1975) [editor]
King Charles II (1979).
Also published as Royal Charles: Charles II and the Restoration and Charles II;
Heroes and Heroines (1980)
The Weaker Vessel: Woman’s Lot in Seventeenth-century England (1984)
The Warrior Queens: Boadicea’s Chariot (1988), Weidenfeld and Nicolson, London.
Also published as Warrior Queens: The Legends and Lives of Women Who have led Their Nations in War.
The Six Wives of Henry VIII (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1996); Orion, 1999.
The Gunpowder Plot: Terror and Faith in 1605 (1996)
Marie Antoinette (2001);
Love and Louis XIV: The Women in the Life of the Sun King (2006);
Must You Go? My Life with Harold Pinter (2010), London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson (Orion Books);
Perilous Question: The Drama of the Great Reform Bill 1832 (2013);
My History. A Memoir of Growing Up (2015), New York:
Our Israeli Diary: Of That Time, Of That Place (2017);
The King and the Catholics: The Fight for Rights, 1829 (2018);
The Case of the Married Woman: Caroline Norton: A 19th Century Heroine Who Wanted Justice for Women (2021);
The Antonia Fraser Collection (2013)
Historical Fiction
King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table (1954)
Robin Hood (1955)
Jemima Shore novels
Quiet as a Nun (1977)
The Wild Island (1978). Also published as Tartan Tragedy.
A Splash of Red (1981)
Cool Repentance (1982)
Oxford Blood (1985)
Jemima Shore’s First Case (1986)
Your Royal Hostage (1987)
The Cavalier Case (1990)
Jemima Shore at the Sunny Grave (1991)
Political Death (1995)
Quiet as a Nun / Tartan Tragedy / Splash of Red (omnibus) (2005)
Jemima Shore on the Case (omnibus) (2006)
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