IZABELA THE VALIANT

A Spectator Best Book of the YearTrawling through a vast family archive and arcane sources in half a dozen languages Adam Zamoyski has revealed the dramatic life of his great great great grandmother an uneducated vulnerable girl cast into a man s world Her aristocratic position enmeshed her in high politics and close encounters with Frederick the Great Benjamin Franklin Rousseau Joseph II Marie Antoinette and Tsar Alexander I and earned her the enmity of Catherine the Great She lived through revolution and no less than five wars in which her cherished homes were devastated her possessions looted and her children scattered Caught up in tempestuous love affairs which led her to nervous breakdown and the brink of suicide exploited by her lovers she remained undaunted and liberated herself through education And unusually for her time she became a caring mother devoted to her children She learned much by travelling extensively around Europe at a time of political and ideological change and her observations particularly on Georgian Britain are remarkable She gradually won the admiration of learned men and intellectual honours She pioneered schooling for children of the poor and developed her own educational methods Fascinated by the power of objects to