Swaggeringly splendid...Stubbs is a brilliant expositor of poetry...one cannot resist being carried along the sheer boldness of the charge and the brilliance and elan of its execution -- John Adamson * Sunday Telegraph *
Terrific . . . This is good roustabout stuff but there is subtlety here too. Stubbs show us, tactfully, that everything we thought we knew about the difference between cavaliers and roundheads is probably wrong -- Kathryn Hughes * Guardian *
An entertaining and ambitious work that intelligently binds together the art and the politics of mid-17th-century England. Its cast of characters could hardly be bettered -- Charles Spencer * Financial Times *
A wonderful survey of the period...extraordinary snapshots of an era that makes our own seem mean, lazy and shamefully inarticulate -- Ned Denny * Evening Standard *
The subtle but powerful light that Stubbs casts on [cavalier life in Stuart England] illuminates also the Puritanism of roundhead England. Stubbs writes that 'literary talent and psychological realism' of the cavalier poets makes them 'precious witnesses of an age'. They are among the qualities that make him one too -- Robert Steward * Spectator *
Fascinating * Daily Express *
Excellent...affectionate but forensic...with considerable skill and insight, Stubbs brings to life an age, a literary movement and, for all their many faults, a group of individuals whose commitment to the king's cause helped to shape the history of England -- Adrian Tinniswood * Literary Review *
Intriguing and immaculately researched * Time Out *
A thoughtful depiction of opposed ideas and mad mutual destruction -- Iain Finlayson * The Times *
Stubbs's fresh and resourceful prose keeps the reader engaged, while he finds countless ingenious ways to draw the literary and political elements together -- Nicola Shulman * Telegraph *
Explores the gilded artistic world of Charles I's court with almost effortless brilliance...marvelously incisive, learned and moving. There is plenty of substance in Stubbs book - and plenty of wit, too -- Dominic Sandbrook * Sunday Times *
