The Warring Queens | History’s Messiest Royal Rivalry | 4

Historian Kate Williams joins Alice and Matt to make the case for Mary, Queen of Scots - and why history's been getting her all wrong. Professor Williams unpicks centuries of blame placed on Mary for her own downfall, and reveals how looking at her life through a modern lens changes everything. And what about Elizabeth I? Kate says their rivalry wasn't just politics - it was personal, petty, and shaped by the impossible position of being two women trying to rule in a world that just didn't want them to. Do you have a suggestion for a scandal you would like us to cover? Or perhaps you have a question you would like to ask our hosts? Email us at [email protected] See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Alice Levine?

  Audible subscribers can listen to all episodes of British Scandal ad-free right now. Join Audible today by downloading the Audible app.

• 0:10Matt Forde?

  I'm Matt Ford.

• 0:11Alice Levine?

  And I'm Alice Levine.

• 0:12Matt Forde?

  And this is British Scandal, an Audible original.

• 0:27Matt Forde?

  Alice, we have had some incredible royal scandals in recent years. But do you think that this scandal could be the worst in British history?

• 0:35Alice Levine?

  Well, it was definitely a very dramatic royal scandal. I don't know if it was the worst, but it was definitely the most tragic. A cousin killing another cousin.

• 0:43Matt Forde?

  Yeah, it's up there. But whose side were you on? Are you team Mary or are you team Liz?

• 0:47Alice Levine?

  It's sort of funny to be taking Instagram feud sides this many years later. It's hard to support the one that signs the death warrant. But she was in a tricky sit to just completely trivialise the whole situation.

• 0:58Matt Forde?

  Yeah, I mean, she wasn't exactly keen to kill off her cousin. But, you know, she's a queen. She's got to act like a queen.

• 1:04Alice Levine?

  Queen's got a queen.

• 1:06Matt Forde?

  Yeah, I think it's fair to say it's complicated. So to get a real understanding of what the situation was like in Tudor Britain and what these rival queens were faced with, we're speaking to a real pro. She's the author of the book Rival Queens: The Betrayal of Mary, Queen of Scots. Her latest book, Regina, is about a history of women and power. And let's face it, you've almost definitely seen her on TV. We've got Professor Kate Williams in the studio after this.

• 1:31Speaker 02

  Hey, I'm David Brown, the host of Business Wars from Audible Originals. Indian Motorcycle and Harley-Davidson once defined American riding until Indian collapsed. Decades later, against the odds, one company dared to bring the iconic brand back, and the rivalry has returned. Listen to Business Wars on Audible or wherever you get your podcasts.

• 1:50Speaker 03

  I'm Candace DeLong, host of the podcast Killer Psyche. In our latest episode, we go inside the case of Lindsey Clancy, the postpartum psychosis defence and the stunning mistrial that just reignited a national debate. Listen to Killer Psyche on Audible or wherever you get your podcasts.

• 2:15Matt Forde?

  Kate, welcome to British Scandal.

• 2:17Speaker 04

  Thank you.

• 2:17Matt Forde?

  It's a pleasure to have you here.

• 2:18Speaker 04

  Delighted to be here.

• 2:20Matt Forde?

  We're thinking about Mary Queen of Scots today. Do you think you'd have got on with her?

• 2:25Speaker 04

  Well, I would not have been in Mary Queen of Scots' circle, let's put it that way. I'm not Scottish, I'm Welsh, but I would not have been in the court circle. I'd have been one of the peasants. But had I suddenly been catapulted into the aristocracy, I think I would have got on with Mary Queen of Scots. She was intelligent, I think she was dynamic, I think she was a kind person, and the fact was that she was this generous, interesting, funny, witty woman who everyone liked. The problem was that because for so many people she symbolised power, she wasn't a person to them.

• 2:59Alice Levine?

  It's sort of impossible to talk about Mary without talking about Elizabeth. How much did they have in common?

• 3:05Speaker 04

  Two queens, one island, and they're both cousins. But I think the big thing that they have in common is that both of them, men are trying to take their power. A woman on the throne is for the men around them, an invitation. They are both a woman in a man's world. And in Elizabeth's case, they exclude her from meetings and then they keep trying to press her to marry. So eventually she says, "I'm not going to call Parliament if this is what you keep saying. I'm not going to call you anymore." But Mary, the men are trying to take her power in a much more violent way. They try and seize her, they try and take her, they sexually assault her. And the fact is that when Mary is sexually assaulted, when she's raped, that what happens is all the men, the aristocrats of Scotland, have made an agreement with her assaulter

• 3:48Speaker 04

  that Mary Queen of Scots will be sexually assaulted, forced into marriage, and then they'll all have power over her. So, yes, they are two women in a man's world, but Elizabeth is not physically threatened in the way that Mary Queen of Scots is. For Mary Queen of Scots, she's pretty much never safe. If someone had tried to kidnap Elizabeth, it would be a... You know, a national absolute shock. It would be disgraceful. The man would be immediately executed. There's just no way it's going to happen in the same way. So Elizabeth and Mary do have a lot in common. Above all, they're cousins. Above all, next in line to Elizabeth's throne is Mary because Mary's grandmother was Henry VIII's older sister. Now, Henry VIII's will has tried to exclude the Scottish line. It basically was written to keep the Scottish

• 4:32Speaker 04

  line away from the English throne. But everyone knows that when it comes to blood, we've got Henry VIII's line, Elizabeth is the last of that. And then the next people that should go to, of course, is the elder sister's line, not the younger sister's line. So Mary, Queen of Scots, is next in line to Elizabeth's throne, and that's what makes her incredibly powerful. But also, to Elizabeth's advisers, that's what makes her so terrifying. Because if Elizabeth dies without that child, Mary is coming to the throne, and some of the advisers have been pretty mean to Mary. So you might think, she might say, yeah, about those manners, maybe I'll have them back.

• 5:08Matt Forde?

  When we think of them being cousins, are we talking proper, proper cousins? Would they have had a familial relationship before all this?

• 5:15Speaker 04

  I think we call them second cousins, but we would imagine that a cousin is brother and sister child. So Mary, Queen of Scots', parents are not Henry VIII's or Catherine of Aragon or Anne Boleyn's siblings. It's the grandparents who are siblings. So it's not in that strict way. But no, they never knew each other. They never met each other. They never had that kind of relationship, but they knew of each other. So there is the age gap of 10 years or so. Also, there's the fact that Elizabeth and Mary, Queen of Scots, had a totally different adolescence. So Mary, Queen of Scots', is queen at just six days old. But instead of staying in Scotland, as you would expect of a queen, she is actually sent off, used as a princess in the marriage market. Off she goes to the French royal family

• 5:56Speaker 04

  to be married to the future King of France. And, you know, everyone in the entirety of Mary, Queen of Scots', story is called Mary or James. So Mary, Queen of Scots', goes off to France with her four ladies-in-waiting, who are all called James.

• 6:11Matt Forde?

  James.

• 6:12Speaker 04

  They are all called James Etta. They're all called Mary. And she goes with her half-brother who's called James. So everyone's called Mary and James. So Mary is brought up in the French court. Now, it's a Game of Thrones brutal place, but it's a brutal place behind polite smiles. For Elizabeth, her adolescence is totally different. She's quite cherished and adored by Henry VIII. But then, as soon as Anne Boleyn is executed, she falls from favour and she's quite excluded from court. She comes back into favour because her stepmothers, like Jane Seymour, are kind to her. But basically, you have a bit of a brutal upbringing with your Elizabeth. So one, her mother gets executed. Then Jane Seymour, her stepmother, dies in childbirth. Then another stepmother is executed, that's Catherine Howard. Then Anne of Cleves, you know, she's the ultimate survivor, but she's pushed out of

• 6:57Speaker 04

  court for a while. Then Catherine Parr dies in childbirth. So, and Catherine Parr's husband, Thomas Seymour, sexually harasses Elizabeth and tries to force her into marriage. So you've got all of that really putting you off marriage. Then, when her brother comes to the throne, she's suspected of being caught, of being a conspiracy, and nearly executed. Then, when her sister comes to the throne, she's suspected of being caught, of being a conspiracy, and nearly executed. So you've had various mother.

• 7:20Alice Levine?

  Families A, Kate.

• 7:21Speaker 04

  You know, exactly. It's the worst family drama. Stepmothers dying, your mother being executed, your sister and brother trying to chop your heads off. I mean, it's getting pretty extreme. Elizabeth's childhood, however, brutal as it is, she's always been in England. So she's associated with England. And when her sister, Mary Tudor, is growing iller and iller, Elizabeth really has a sort of shadow cabinet around her. So she's ready to step into place. Whereas Mary is in France, she's isolated, she's associated with France, but she doesn't have that same circle of loyal men who will go to the death for her.

• 7:54Alice Levine?

  So is your sense that Elizabeth saw Mary as a threat? Or was she not really factoring into her daily thinking?

• 8:02Speaker 04

  Everyone is fearful for Elizabeth's safety, apart from Elizabeth. She is totally convinced, and she's right, that the people won't kill her. Elizabeth says, "Oh, everyone loves me. I'm just so popular." And she is. "I'm adored. You don't need to worry." And her advisers say, "No, no, you're going to die. They're trying to kill you." Everyone's trying to kill you and they're all panicking about her safety. They're the most super over cautious bodyguards. And so Mary Queen of Scots is seen as an absolutely public enemy number one by Elizabeth's advisers. That's partly because they fear that Mary's going to try and bring the country back to Catholicism if she comes to the throne. She's not, she hasn't tried to do that in Scotland, why should she try to do that in England? Elizabeth has much more sympathy for Mary Queen of Scots, she's got a lot of sympathy for her.

• 8:47Speaker 04

  Elizabeth knows that if she punishes Mary Queen of Scots or executes her, everyone's going to blame her. No one's going to blame the advisers, they're all going to say, Elizabeth, you bad person. And the fact is that you can cut off the heads of as many men as you want and that's fine. Cut them off if they come into your bedroom, cut them off for anything. But you cannot cut off the head of a woman without people condemning you, a woman, a cousin, a queen. And above all, Elizabeth is very clever, she's very bright. She knows that they've both been insulted by sexist anti-queen people. So she knows that if people undermine Mary Queen of Scots, if people say she's a bad queen, if people say she's useless on the throne, those ideas will rebound on her. So Elizabeth sees it as to her benefit that Mary Queen of Scots is in a strong position.

• 9:32Speaker 04

  And she's constantly trying to help Mary Queen of Scots and her advisers say, oh no, no, oh no, don't. Just let the Protestant men take charge instead. So there is this fight between advisers and Elizabeth. And I think in the end, Elizabeth's advisers, they can go with one woman on the throne, but two, that is not going to happen.

• 9:51Alice Levine?

  Let's not be ridiculous.

• 9:52Speaker 04

  Yeah, I know, exactly.

• 9:53Alice Levine?

  It's Claudia and Tess doing Strictly all over again, to be honest with you.

• 9:57Matt Forde?

  Those advisers always get a bad rap, don't they? We always imagine them to be deeply Machiavellian, out for themselves. And obviously it's, you use the analogy of a shadow cabinet. But I guess it's a court because in a shadow cabinet, people have their own mandates and someone in the shadow cabinet could replace the leader. But none of these advisers could become queen or king. So what are their agendas? Obviously, we imagine people like Thomas Cromwell and some of the famous ones from the past. But are they all like that? Or would some of them actually have been really good political advisers who genuinely wanted to serve the monarch?

• 10:26Speaker 04

  I think they are really good political advisers. I think they are the brightest and best men of the day. I think they are incredibly intelligent. And I think we see the greatest expansion of the state under Elizabeth the First. And, you know, they're incredible civil servants. And in the end. You can be the cleverest, you can be the most intelligent, you can be the most dynamic person, but in the 16th century, the only way to get on is by serving the crown. You can't go and set up your own start-up or business or, you know, the only way to really explore your talents and to get to the top of society if you're not royal is to serve the royals. So that's what the greatest men have to do. William Cecil, Elizabeth's right-hand man, is a brilliant man, but they are also too

• 11:11Speaker 04

  concerned, too threatened, too fearful of Mary Queen of Scots, who was in the end no threat to them.

• 11:17Matt Forde?

  And also, is it hard to give advice if you fear you're going to get your head chopped off?

• 11:20Speaker 04

  Well, Elizabeth I is much less of a head chopper off than Henry VIII. So Henry VIII, how many people did he chop heads off? It's hard to know, but I think a conservative estimate is 20,000. I've seen estimates in some. Bloody hell. I know, it's a lot, isn't it? It's a lot. I mean, obviously, including a couple of wives, various best friends, his groom of the stool, their job is to go to the loo with you, and that's a very sought-after job, to go to the loo with the king, because you get that intimate one-to-one time and, you know, imagine that Henry VIII might have been on the loo for a while.

• 11:50Matt Forde?

  That's where Privy Council comes from.

• 11:51Speaker 04

  Yes, that's where Privy Council comes from. Even he chops off his best friend, Henry Norris, who, he's been his loo friend, so that's no guardian. So Henry VIII, you know, I've seen between 20 and 72,000, so, I mean, huge amounts of people.

• 12:03Matt Forde?

  Is that Old Trafford?

• 12:04Speaker 04

  It's an arena tour.

• 12:05Matt Forde?

  My god, it's a stadium, isn't it?

• 12:06Speaker 04

  I mean, if there's such a thing as the afterlife, Henry VIII has a reckoning. There are lots of people waiting to see him. So Elizabeth does execute, she does execute, but it is much harder to be executed under Elizabeth. She's much more likely to be a rebellion for someone who is obviously going against the religion of the country. She's less likely to execute her advisers. You've really, really got to get on the wrong side of her. You can't just make a few mistakes like Thomas Cromwell and marry Henry VIII off to the wrong person. But the risk is that you could lose everything. The risk is that the monarch, who is all-powerful, could throw you out of favour, you could lose all your power, lose all your glory, and, you know, lose a lot of the estates and money that you have. So, of course, they build up their own levels of wealth, but everything that you have is at the monarch's favour.

• 12:51Speaker 04

  So you do everything to both make yourself indispensable to the monarch and also stay in power. So I think a lot of the, "Mary Queen of Scots, terrible, only we can protect you", is trying to make themselves indispensable to Elizabeth.

• 13:03Matt Forde?

  It's like working for Putin.

• 13:05Speaker 04

  Well, yes, like working for Putin, yes.

• 13:07Matt Forde?

  You're sort of like a council advisers, you're there totally at his patronage. There's a certain amount of large S that goes with it, you get a gas company or whatever. But if he decides it's over, you're out.

• 13:17Speaker 04

  And this is how exactly it worked, and we see this under Henry VIII. But Elizabeth, you do see a difference, you see the sort of beginning of what we would see as a professional civil service, people are much less likely to be in and out on the whims of a monarch. And you certainly see the advancing, I think, of a monarchy that is less despotic and more of a monarchy that is about advisers, listening to the Privy Council. And Elizabeth is increasingly excluded from the key decisions, most chiefly that one of executing Mary Queen of Scots.

• 13:47Alice Levine?

  Obviously, Mary is a royal, so by no one's estimations is a sort of woman of the people. But you've mentioned her treatment as somebody controlled by men, as somebody abused by men. How representative is that of a woman's experience in Tudor times?

• 14:06Speaker 04

  Well, Mary's life as a woman in Tudor times is very much how life was. I mean, you have a situation in 16th century England where everything, when you get married, everything you you own is your husband's, absolutely everything, right down to your shoes and your comb. So he has total rights over your person. And if a woman kills her husband, the punishment is much, much more severe than it is for a man who kills his wife. So men and women are treated very differently. And this is what fascinates me about Mary Queen of Scots and the sexual assault and the rape of Mary Queen of Scots, is that it happened. But history since then has started to say, oh, are you sure? Well, it didn't happen because she was a queen.

• 14:49Speaker 04

  And the fact is, people say, well, how could Mary have been assaulted? Because she then marries Bothwell. And why would she do that if he'd assaulted her? And no one really asked this question in the 16th century. And I'm not saying 16th century had any sophisticated understanding of Me Too or anything whatsoever. But they did understand the power dynamic and they understood that if a woman is kidnapped by a man and taken to his castle, the reason is he's going to force her. Into marriage and you have no choice, you have to marry him, Mary thought she was pregnant. Bothwell probably raped Mary, but she married him anyway, but she had no choice. She had no choice, she thought she was pregnant, she knew that all the lords had assented to this in this sort of, you can go and rape Mary, we'll all agree to it as long as you share power with us.

• 15:35Speaker 04

  They'd all agreed to it, so how could she fight back? But above all, you know, that's what happens to women. Elizabeth is an anomaly in the fact that she's not forced into marriage. And, you know, with Elizabeth and Mary, we see the ultimate problem of a queen. In the 16th century, they agree, well, okay, we've got to have a woman on the throne. Let's just deal with it because blood is blood. But what do you do about the queen's husband? The queen's husband will try and seize power, the queen's husband will want to be a king. And even if you have a husband who doesn't try and seize power and want to be a king, which is what Mary, Queen of Scots has, who she surprisingly calls James. When you have that son, he's got no teeth, he can't sit up, it doesn't matter. He's superior to you, it's the beginning of the end of things for her.

• 16:17Speaker 04

  They are trying to push off the throne because someone can be regent for the son. So Elizabeth knows that if she marries, I mean, she has 26 marriage proposals at least. Or every man across Europe wants to marry Elizabeth, she's number one on the marriage market. But she knows that if she marries, she'll be seen as subservient to him. And even if she negotiates the power in the relationship of the marriage, which I think she could, still, the minute she has that boy, she could be deposed and that's her fear. So, you know, the queen's husband is the biggest question of this period.

• 16:50Alice Levine?

  I found that parallel with the modern conversation about male abusers and women staying close to them. I can't believe that we're still having that conversation. Oh, it couldn't have been rape because.

• 17:03Speaker 04

  Because she spoke to him afterwards.

• 17:04Alice Levine?

  Right.

• 17:04Speaker 04

  She texted him afterwards.

• 17:06Alice Levine?

  Exactly.

• 17:06Speaker 04

  She met up with him afterwards, yes, you know, that totally is it, that rape is only rape when it's a stranger and they hit you over the head and you fight back physically. And, and this, oh, Mary, Queen of Scots, set it up, she wanted to marry him and set it up for herself. And all these misogynist, you know.

• 17:22Alice Levine?

  Mental gymnastics to try and explain it.

• 17:24Speaker 04

  It's women's. Whatever happens, it's women's fault. And the fact that still it was ninety two or ninety one that rape in marriage was made illegal, that it was still legal in the lifetimes of all of us. And that was something you could not prosecute your husband for. And that idea that a woman is a man's possession and totally subject to male power. But when it comes to rape, if she doesn't fight back, if she, you know, tries to find ways of ameliorating it, it's her fault. Mary Queen of Scots, she's the queen. She's the most powerful woman in the country. She's wealthy. She's got this royal bludge, which for many is seen as magical, untouchable. And still, she's not just raped by Bothwell and seized, but also all the other men, her

• 18:09Speaker 04

  friends and advisers, have made this deal with Bothwell that if you rape her and marry her and force her into marriage and share power with us, that's great.

• 18:19Alice Levine?

  It's state sanctioned.

• 18:20Speaker 04

  Yeah, it's state sanctioned. It is state sanctioned. And the only reason why they rise up against Bothwell and Mary is not because she marries him, not because he sexually assaulted her, but also because he won't share power.

• 18:33Matt Forde?

  Bothwell is one case. Dudley is another. Quite weird sexual politics between Elizabeth and Mary with that menage a trois.

• 18:41Speaker 04

  Oh Dudley, yes.

• 18:42Matt Forde?

  Is that unique for the time?

• 18:44Speaker 04

  Why is she saying to Mary, marry my ex? Why not? Now.

• 18:49Alice Levine?

  She's a kook.

• 18:50Speaker 04

  Is it some kind of weird sexual setup that Elizabeth could never marry him, so she wants Mary to do so? You know what I think? I think it's that Elizabeth, even though she has this circle of men around her, this counsel, these advisers, that she knows she can't trust them. And she can really, really trust Dudley. They are best friends. They know everything about each other. So she knows that if he marries Mary Queen of Scots, despite Mary Queen of Scots being so beautiful and charming, that he'll always be on her side. So she puts him in Mary's orbit. And Elizabeth's idea is that they'll all live at court together. So they'll all live in the English court together. Robert?

• 19:31Speaker 04

  Elizabeth, Mary. So it was a ridiculous idea, but to me Dudley was Mary's best bet. I mean, so much better than Darnley, who tried to seize power. Dudley wouldn't have tried to be king of Scotland. He just wanted to be Elizabeth's master of the horse. And I think if Mary, Queen of Scots, had stayed in Scotland and married Dudley, there were two things she would have got. Number one was the lords who were so aggressive towards Mary, they would have known that Dudley is there. And Dudley's not just a powerful man, he's also got Elizabeth's seal of approval. So they would have had that bodyguard. And also Dudley would never be there. Dudley would always be in London with Elizabeth

• 20:12Speaker 04

  going riding. So Mary doesn't need a husband. She really needs a sperm donor. So Dudley could have come up, got her pregnant, gone back, and she's got the heir. She's got the heir that she needs. And I think also the lords would have been intimidated. A perfect marriage. Exactly, exactly. Pop in, pop out. So, you know, Mary would never have agreed to marry him. But I think when you look at the disastrous other husbands that she had, I mean, they're totally terrible. Dudley always hanging around with Elizabeth and really showing to the lords around Mary that, mm, England's watching you would have been a good option. But he didn't really want to marry her either. He just wanted to be there with Elizabeth, taking her riding.

• 20:57Speaker 05

  Hey, I'm Cassie DePecce. The host of Against the Odds from Audible Originals. In each episode, we share thrilling true stories of survival, putting you in the shoes of the people who lived to tell the tale. In our latest series, we track the story of Hugh Glass, the real life revenant that inspired the 2015 film starring Leonardo DiCaprio. In 1823, Glass was brutally mauled by a grizzly bear in present day South Dakota and left for dead. His survival depended on trekking through 350 miles of wilderness alone with grave injuries. But he was driven by his thirst for revenge. Follow Against the Odds wherever you get your podcasts. Audible subscribers can binge all episodes of Against the Odds early and ad free right now. Join Audible in the Audible app or by subscribing on Apple Podcasts.

• 21:42Speaker 06

  A trucker merges onto the I-10 in New Orleans. He checks his mirrors. The lane is clear. And then boom, impact. A pickup truck, seemingly out of nowhere, scrapes down the side of his 18-wheeler. Multiple passengers inside. One man flees the scene. And the driver of the pickup? He doesn't seem all that upset. It didn't feel like a regular accident, because it wasn't. Across the city, truckers are getting sideswiped, all on the same stretch of the same freeway. And behind many of the cases is one person, a Hollywood stunt woman turned personal injury lawyer named Vanessa Moda. This podcast is a story about fake accidents that lead to real consequences and a scheme that ends in betrayal and murder.

• 22:27Speaker 06

  Listen to Over My Dead Body: Operation Sideswipe wherever you get your podcasts. Audible subscribers can binge all episodes early and ad-free right now. Join Audible in the Audible app or by subscribing on Apple Podcasts or Spotify.

• 22:47Alice Levine?

  So we talked a little bit about the royal or political roles and functions of being a queen. But what would it have been like day to day in the 16th century to be a queen? What's happening? How are you filling your time?

• 23:00Speaker 04

  You know, day to day, it's not so dissimilar to the role of a monarch. So your daily life is one of court ceremony. It's one of court meetings. It's one of meeting with your privy council. It's one of discussing various political and foreign policy issues. And you also have a huge amount of ceremonies. So you have court occasions. You have court banquets, dances. These banquets and dances are not just fun and games. They're ways in which the court shows its hierarchy. But the court is a very male world. So we have about roughly 1,000 to 2,000 people in Elizabeth's court. So there are a lot of people. Mary Queen of Scots's court is smaller, probably more like 400, 500. But it's still significant.

• 23:45Speaker 04

  But the only real women at court are the ladies in waiting. So we might wonder when we look at Henry VIII, why does he keep? Dumping his wives for ladies in waiting, but the lady in waitings, they're the only women in court. So it is really not dissimilar to the role of a monarch now, except then you make all the decisions.

• 24:06Matt Forde?

  And did people genuinely believe that women were capable of governing? Or was it just tolerated because of the bloodline?

• 24:12Speaker 04

  Absolutely not. People were just desperate by the time they got to Mary and Elizabeth. So you see Henry VIII turning the world upside down in the hope of having a male heir. And isn't it the ultimate irony that the best queen is his daughter, Elizabeth I? So he could have just left it at that. But still, people absolutely do not believe that a woman can come to the throne. But there is no choice because blood supersedes anything else. So the whole point of monarchy is that blood comes first. And even though Henry VIII has illegitimate male children, they cannot supersede the female legitimate line. Now, he thinks about putting those male children into power, but it's not going to be well received. It

• 24:54Speaker 04

  has to be the bloodline. So in the end, it has got to be Henry's daughter, Mary, and it's got to be Elizabeth. And we often forget for Elizabeth, her life is made easier, I would argue, because Mary, her sister, paves the way. When Mary comes to the throne, there's an act concerning the Queen's Majesty that says, everyone, the Queen has got majesty in the same way a man does, just to say, it's the same. And everyone's like, oh, really? How fascinating. So Mary's only on the throne for five years, but really, the idea of a queen regnant has been really set up by Mary I. We'll have to remember that the law was

• 25:31Speaker 04

  only changed in 2013 to put birth order in front of pumogeniture. So up until 2013, you could have a girl, and then you could have five more girls. But then if you had a boy, he would take the throne, not the girl. So of course, we have the situation now that instead of the succession being Charles, Anne, Andrew, it is Charles, then Andrew, then Edward. The idea, I think, that Anne was pushed out of the succession by Andrew just under What a disastrous idea it was. So, no, no one wants a woman on the throne, but they have to have a woman on the throne because there simply is no choice. And Mary the first,

• 26:13Speaker 04

  and then Elizabeth, prove above all that a woman can do it. They are popular, they are loved. I mean, Elizabeth creates this incredible iconography of Gloriana with the portraits and the poems and the speeches. I mean, she's almost magical. And yet, still, for so many, it's undeniable that had she married and had she had a son, called him Henry, immediately people would have started to say, hmm, maybe it's time for you to step back. Maybe actually, Henry should be the king.

• 26:43Alice Levine?

  So do you think Elizabeth's success as a queen was policy, or was it also about charisma? Did she just sort of charm people as well?

• 26:54Speaker 04

  I think Elizabeth's success was due to absolutely policy. I think above all, she wanted stability. So we see with her religious settlement, she pretty much says, look, guys, if you just keep up appearances, if you just look like you're going to church, you can do what you want. I'm not seeing into men's hearts. Just don't go against me and I'll let you off.

• 27:16Alice Levine?

  Don't ask, don't tell.

• 27:17Speaker 04

  Yeah, exactly. Don't ask, don't tell. And, you know, crucifixes are allowed. She has Catholic books herself with her sister and her brother. She's seen really the perils of extremism, religious extremism. So she just wants a middle ground. And frankly, so do the rest of the country. They just want to get on with their lives. And they just want to carry on opening shops and pubs, which is what people in the 16th century want to do. They want to go shopping and they want to go to the pub. That's what makes Elizabeth very popular, that she says, look, just, we're just going to settle. We're just going to all sit quietly and we're just going to have stability. So Elizabeth aims above all for stability. Apparently Madonna's genius at constantly reinventing herself meant that she kept firing her stylists. She never kept the same one. She always moved between them.

• 28:00Speaker 04

  And that's, I think, what Elizabeth did. She always fired her stylists. She had different portraits, different portractions, and created this brilliant image of Gloriana, the rainbow portrait. These pearls, the Armada portrait, they are incredible. I mean, Elizabeth's incredible skill as a woman in a man's world is procrastination. Now, you know, every time I go on the internet, there's a big sign, I think it was in my algorithm, saying, how not to procrastinate. But Elizabeth was the ultimate procrastinator, the ultimate prevaricator. Asked to make a decision, she prevaricate. She said, I'm not sure. I've got to think about it.

• 28:39Matt Forde?

  You like Gordon Brown?

• 28:41Speaker 04

  That is an interesting comparison. I hadn't thought of like Gordon Brown. She, I mean, certainly Elizabeth was tight on the purse strings and didn't pay the sailors of the Armada. That wasn't very popular. But yes.

• 28:53Matt Forde?

  Prudent.

• 28:54Speaker 04

  Prudent. Elizabeth was the brilliant prevaricator and that bought her time in a world of men. And when it came to Mary, Queen of Scots, that was what she expected to do. She was forced to sign the death warrant. She didn't really have any choice. But she really expected to leave Mary on death row. But instead, the men around her, since they got their hands on that document, they enacted it without her knowing. So Elizabeth's skill is, I think, emphasis on stability, is emphasis on just letting people live, is the brilliance she has at imagery, but also being so great at procrastinating.

• 29:30Matt Forde?

  How does Mary compare to Elizabeth then, in terms of her relative popularity and the different approaches she took?

• 29:37Speaker 04

  What history often likes to do is to say that there are two queens in this island, and Elizabeth was a success and Mary was a failure. And this totally obviates the fact that they are living in unimaginably different worlds. No one's going to try and sexually seize Elizabeth. I mean, this will be anathema. This is Henry VIII's daughter. So Mary's living in a much more violent world. And Mary's living in a world in which the men, the aristocrats, have, while she's been in France, got used to doing whatever they like and got used to seizing power, and they are going to do that. On top of this, Elizabeth's world doesn't pay much attention to the illegitimate children. The illegitimate of children of Henry VIII, not really a threat to her. In Mary's world...

• 30:22Speaker 04

  It's a different perception of the illegitimate children of the king. So her half brother, her brother by her father and a mistress, James Stuart, he is a huge threat to her and leads a lot of the plotting against her. And really, when Mary comes back from France to take up her throne officially at eighteen, her half brother is behind her and what he wants is her to be a puppet and her to be a puppet and let him govern through her. And she's seen Elizabeth, she doesn't want to be a puppet, she wants to reign for herself. And had she been a puppet, she would have survived, but she wants to reign for herself. And that's brave and that's courageous, but that's why she dies and that's why she is lost and executed.

• 31:05Speaker 04

  So Mary's life is totally different, but she does a lot of the things that Elizabeth does. Mary has Protestants and Catholics on her council, she listens to her ministers, all the things that Elizabeth is congratulated for doing, Mary does too. The main difference between Elizabeth and Mary is that Mary knows that she has to get married and Elizabeth doesn't marry. And if Mary hadn't married, she would have been on the throne for a much longer time.

• 31:30Alice Levine?

  And so why did Elizabeth and Mary never meet?

• 31:33Speaker 04

  A meeting was Mary's greatest desire. When she comes back from France aged eighteen, that's what she wants above all, to meet Elizabeth. There's talk made of meeting at York, but it all crumbles because the advisers think it's going to be too much Catholicism, Mary's going to cause problems. Elizabeth's advisers are so heavily Protestant, they're very fearful of Mary, so it doesn't happen. And Mary keeps hoping for it over and over. And even when she's imprisoned, she hopes to meet Elizabeth. And really, she believes in this so much, it's almost tragic. So when she's told she's going to be executed, that moment is really when she stops trying to appeal or write to Elizabeth. So she doesn't write to Elizabeth, her letter is to the King of France and she says,

• 32:15Speaker 04

  "I am going to be executed at eight in the morning like a criminal." She doesn't write to Elizabeth anymore. And they didn't meet because Elizabeth's advisers didn't want them to meet. That would be a disastrous festival of female power, but also. They are fearful that if Mary meets Elizabeth, Elizabeth will be too amenable to her, too nice to Scotland, too nice to Catholic Scotland. I mean, it's not Catholic. Mary has not restored Catholicism, but there's this image that she's public enemy number one. And over and over again, they say to Elizabeth, Mary's trying to kill you, Mary's trying to depose you. And Elizabeth doesn't believe it. But Mary and Elizabeth do finally meet, and they finally meet in death. They finally meet in Westminster Abbey. They are close.

• 32:59Speaker 04

  They are meeting in death in a way they never met in life because when Mary's son James comes to the throne after Elizabeth dies in sixteen oh three, he disenters his mother from where she's been buried in Peterborough Cathedral, near where she was executed, keeping Catherine of Aragon company. He disenters her and he puts her in Westminster Abbey and he puts her in the biggest, blingiest tomb you can imagine. And this gigantic tomb that she gets in Westminster Abbey. And he writes this incredible script on the tomb, which says she's the daughter, the bride, the mother of kings. He said that she had courageously and vigorously, but vainly, fought against the obloquies of her foes and the crafty devices of her mortal enemies.

• 33:44Speaker 04

  She was at last struck down by the axe, a precedent outrageous to royalty. So, you know, he's actually saying here, her enemies, her crafty foes, not just in Scotland, but also in England, these men that had advised her. And he says, mistress of Scotland by law, of France by marriage, and of England by expectation, blessed by a threefold right. So James actually gives Mary this gigantic tomb and he writes this huge Instagram post on it saying.

• 34:12Alice Levine?

  It's an incredible CV.

• 34:14Speaker 04

  Yeah, exactly. Saying, I mean, look at, you know, she has got every bit of royal blood you can imagine. Sorry, Elizabeth, but you know, you were rendered illegitimate because, you know, your mother.

• 34:22Alice Levine?

  Hate to mention it.

• 34:23Speaker 04

  Sorry.

• 34:24Alice Levine?

  Saw the elephant in the room that no one's talking about.

• 34:25Speaker 04

  But you're legit, you know, and she is courageously and vigorously fought back against her foes. And he puts this on her tomb. And yet, that's why she dies because what makes her so powerful is that she's. Into blood terms, next in line to Elizabeth's throne. But that also is what makes her so dangerous. And the problem is that Elizabeth is seen by much of Catholic Europe as illegitimate, because the marriage to Amberlin was illegitimate, and Henry also annulled that marriage just before he executed. I mean, you know, so many people would say, the only legitimate descendant who's still alive is Mary, Queen of Scots.

• 35:00Matt Forde?

  How hard do you think it was for Elizabeth to sign Mary's death warrant?

• 35:04Speaker 04

  I think it was impossible for Elizabeth to sign Mary's death warrant. She really, really didn't want to do it. She kept saying, well, couldn't someone like, push her down the stairs? What if she sort of fell over? I mean, people have been pushed down the stairs, haven't they? We've seen, well, Dudley's wife fell down the stairs. Stairs are clearly treacherous places in 16th century England. So she keeps saying, could someone just, I don't know, could you just fall over?

• 35:31Alice Levine?

  A dignified death.

• 35:32Speaker 04

  Yeah. And all the, and all the keepers say, oh, no, no, no, no, we must keep her safe. Absolutely not. No, no, no, you must sign the warrant, madam. She doesn't want to for various reasons. She knows that she'll be blamed for this. She's executed any amount of men, absolutely. But executing a woman, executing a queen, executing her cousin is going to look bad. And she fears particularly that Philip of Spain, who is this great, powerful monarch in Europe, he was married to Elizabeth's half-sister, Mary. He's tried to marry Elizabeth, she said no. But he's really been kept on side. He's quite friendly with Elizabeth.

• 36:13Speaker 04

  But she fears that if she executes Mary, Queen of Scots, he will take revenge and he will invade. Elizabeth is a very intelligent woman. She knows that these men around her are always trying to undermine her. And what they are pushing her towards is a figurehead monarchy. Now, of course, constitutional monarchy is what we all want, but it's interesting, it progresses in the reign of queens. And she knows she's being pushed to this. And she knows that if you execute a queen, then you are undermining the whole principle of monarchy. The idea that the queen is only answerable to God. But she's forced into it, they lie to her, they press her into it, they say she has to do it. And Elizabeth only signs the death warrant because she believes, I am the queen.

• 36:57Speaker 04

  I will have control of when Mary dies, so I'll sign it. But it won't be enacted. Then we have to have more meetings to discuss whether it will be enacted. But instead, the minute Elizabeth has signed the death warrant, her advisers seize it and they enact it as fast as they can before Elizabeth can find out. And that's also the reason why Mary's execution is so undignified, so cruel, so barbaric, that we have a situation where the executioner is actually going to undress her on the block. And one of the watching men says, that can't happen. It's disgraceful. So her ladies do it. And, you know, she's executed, as she puts it, like a criminal in a public execution. And that's because Elizabeth has no clue it's going on.

• 37:42Speaker 04

  And when Elizabeth hears the news, she's incandescent and she has to beg forgiveness of Mary's son, James VI of Scotland. And when Victoria, it's clear that she's going to come to the throne. There's some talk of changing her name to Elizabeth. But really, Elizabeth isn't seen as a good model for Victoria. Not just because she hasn't got married and has children, and that's what all women should do, but also because she executed her cousin, a woman, a queen. And that is seen by the Victorians, and indeed by the 18th century, by the Romantics before, as really Elizabeth's most terrible act.

• 38:20Speaker 07

  You stepped out for your morning jog, except it's not your usual morning jog. You started listening to an epic sci fi book on Audible. Thirty chapters later, you've accidentally run a half marathon. You lost track of how far you've run, somewhere just past the city limits. You can't stop. You have to find out what happens next. Then it's over. The universe seems bigger. You feel different. You feel like you have no idea where you are. Audible, stories that speak to you.

• 38:50Speaker 02

  By 1779, Benedict Arnold had sacrificed more for the revolution than almost any other man in America. One of George Washington's most effective commanders, he had nearly lost a leg in the Second Battle of Saratoga. But in return, Arnold believed he had been humiliated by Congress and cheated of his glory by lesser men. So he decided to make them pay.

• 39:12Speaker 06

  Hi, I'm Lindsey Graham, the host of the podcast American Scandal. We bring to life some of the biggest controversies in US history. Presidential lies, environmental disasters, corporate fraud. In our latest series, Benedict Arnold turns his back on his comrades in the Continental Army and secretly defects to the British. With the help of his wife, he plots to hand over the most important colonial fortress to the enemy and doom the revolution he once served. Follow American Scandal wherever you get your podcasts. Audible subscribers can binge all episodes of American Scandal early and ad-free right now. Join Audible on the Audible app or by subscribing on Apple Podcasts.

• 39:55Matt Forde?

  What changed for female leaders after the battle between the two queens that we've covered this series?

• 39:59Speaker 04

  Well, you might say that nothing had changed for female leaders. We had a brief flowering of female monarchy and then we go back to business as usual. We've got James VI of Scotland coming to be James I of England and he's got a male heir and on and on it goes. But actually, there's something that people often forget is that so not long after James comes to the throne, we have the gunpowder plot. And the actual aim of the gunpowder plotters was to get rid of James, of course, but it was to put on the throne his daughter, Elizabeth. And that is quite fascinating that they wanted another queen on the throne so soon after Elizabeth had died. So you do have this movement towards supporting female rule.

• 40:43Speaker 04

  But the great legacy of Elizabeth and Mary, Queen of Scots, is not just a female rule, it's also for the idea that you can execute. Because on the marvelous, fabulous, bling tomb that James puts up for his mother, Mary, Queen of Scots, in Westminster Abbey, he says, "May all who are descended from her be blessed by eternal life." But that's not what happens. So her son comes to the throne and... James is so obsessed by Divine Rite of Kings, I think partly because his mother's been executed. He's totally obsessed by only God can tell me what to do. And then who gets executed? His son.

• 41:21Speaker 04

  So Mary, Queen of Scots' grandson, Charles the First, gets executed for essentially not doing your job as king properly. And I think it's very clear that Mary, Queen of Scots' execution and trial enables the possibility that then Charles can also be put on trial and executed. So that is one great legacy that we see execution firing. It's like The Apprentice, you can be, you're fired as a monarch. But in terms of female rule, after Elizabeth, after Mary the First, after Mary, Queen of Scots, you cannot say that women cannot reign.

• 41:57Alice Levine?

  In this story, you've described such steeliness and courage and ambition from these women. I wonder if you think of it as a tragedy, not just for Mary, but for Elizabeth as well?

• 42:09Speaker 04

  It's totally a tragedy. Mary, Queen of Scots is the ultimate tragedy. And I think we see everything in terms of women's powerlessness and women's situation in society writ large, from sexual assault to seizing her person, to the lack of respect, to constantly being undermined and betrayed. But we also see that with Elizabeth in a different way. This betrayal, the fact that she was constantly being pushed by her closest friends and advisers. Why aren't you marrying? You have to marry. And power was taken from her by her closest friends and advisers. So we have these two tragedies. One is a tragedy, it's like a Shakespearean play played out on, you know, in great form. And the other one that's really done in boardrooms and via Tudor emails, but still an undermining all the same.

• 42:53Speaker 04

  And that the fact was, there were these two queens. They had more in common than anyone else around them. They'd both grown up in a very friendless way. They'd had, you know, a life of great isolation and suffering and had to survive by their wits in various courts. They understood each other and their situations more than anyone else. And the only way that Elizabeth could survive as queen in the end was by being forced into executing her cousin.

• 43:22Matt Forde?

  Are there any parallels between the experience that Elizabeth and Mary had and the pressures on women in power today?

• 43:28Speaker 04

  I think there are many, many parallels. These women in power show us above all that we don't want a woman in power. I mean, when are we ever going to elect a woman as president of the United States? Even now, when we have a situation in which, you know, women's equality is enshrined in law, certainly in the UK and most of Europe, we still have a situation by which we don't want women in power. And there's a real fear of women in power is largely that they will give ordinary women too much. And that is, I think, the ultimate fear that a woman in power will, by example, or by actual changing the laws, will upset the apple cart and mean that women get more freedom.

• 44:11Speaker 04

  And certainly, a lot of the women who have succeeded to be in power cannot do that. They haven't been able to say, oh, yes, let's loosen divorce law, let's increase equality, let's increase workplace equality.

• 44:22Matt Forde?

  It's a really interesting point, because the three female prime ministers we've had have all been right wing. The fact that our three prime ministers have been right wing, do you think that's because effectively either the body politic, or by extension, the populace can only tolerate a female leader if they think actually they're a woman, but they're not a feminist?

• 44:38Speaker 04

  That's certainly what history shows to us, is that if you want to be elected as a woman, your best chance is being right wing. You are not going to be elected if you're left wing.

• 44:47Matt Forde?

  Angela Merkel.

• 44:48Speaker 04

  And that's, well, I mean, it is, I think it's very difficult across the world. And I think you also very clearly have to say, I want nothing to do with feminism. You have to say that, whatever you believe, and you can't surround yourselves with women. So Queen Victoria said she was totally against votes for women. She said it was a mad, wicked folly. And, I mean, she pretty much had to say that, whether she agreed with votes for women or not. But the great irony of Victoria is that she was used by the suffragettes as an example. They said, look, you say that women can't understand politics, but the Queen does. The Queen talks to her ministers, the Queen understands politics, so why can't we? I think it's very difficult as a woman to give women more rights, because this is simply

• 45:32Speaker 04

  seen as something that goes against the status quo. And so it's not a dissimilar situation to Elizabeth I. You're allowed to be the Queen, you're allowed to be in a position of power, but you have to show yourself as an anomaly.

• 45:49Alice Levine?

  Do you feel like Mary and Elizabeth lost some of their humanity in becoming symbols of female power in a male world?

• 45:57Speaker 04

  I think that all monarchs have to be a symbol, that's how it works. And the better a symbol you are, the more powerful you're going to be. So if you can occupy a symbol in the most effective way, you're going to last. So Victoria is the middle-class housewife, the mercantile-class housewife. Elizabeth II becomes first the radiant queen in the coronation, then the nation's grandmother, always dressing the same, always looking the same. You have to do the same. So that's what Gloriana does. Elizabeth I is Gloriana, is this incredible vision, and she has to be a symbol. I just find it just totally wrong, the way people get obsessed with the idea that Elizabeth didn't look like her portraits. And they say, oh, oh no, you know, she was so old and she was wrinkly, oh my goodness.

• 46:41Speaker 04

  There was this one 50s scholar who wrote that, well, actually at Tilbury, when she makes her great speech about the the heart and stomach of a king, if they'd have looked closely, they'd have seen a spinster in her middle 50s with bad teeth on a fat horse. And you'd say, no, they wouldn't. They would have seen the queen. And I love it that every monarch puts on a filter. Looking at you, Henry VIII, looking at you, George IV.

• 47:04Alice Levine?

  Yeah, male portraits of male monarchs.

• 47:06Speaker 04

  George IV's like a triangle. He's like giant, giant shoulders and teeny tiny ankles when he was very, very large and fat-shamed rather much by the caricaturist and body-shamed. But Elizabeth's portraits are the ones people want to analyse and say, oh, but, but she had bad teeth or bad skin and she was wrinkly. She doesn't look wrinkly like that in the rainbow portrait. But the portraits aren't about what she herself looked like. They are about the vision of majesty. They are about the ideal, the glory. These images of Elizabeth have to be the ones that supersede. And that's what's important. So I just think sexist rubbish when people say, oh, but, oh, maybe she had bad teeth and her hairline was receding. It's like, that's not the point.

• 47:50Speaker 04

  So Elizabeth has to be a symbol, a political genius, a religious genius. But above all, she wove this myth, she wove this image, and that's what people wanted.

• 48:02Matt Forde?

  If you could only have dinner with either Mary or Elizabeth, who would you go to dinner with and what would you ask them?

• 48:08Speaker 04

  Hundred percent, Mary, because I think Elizabeth has a me en and that she keeps up with strangers and you can't get under that. But also, I would have met Mary and I would have said to her, I've got some advice for you. Look, Mary, listen to me. Do not go to England. You either stay and fight for your throne, you'll probably die, but you'll get it back, or you go to France. I would have also said to her, Elizabeth's between a rock and a hard place. She does want to support you. She does support the idea of queenship, but she's being forced to separate away from you and in the end, that will be overwhelming. I think I would have asked her to run away with me. I think I would have said, let's run away now. Let's go to France now. You've got the money. She could have been such a great queen.

• 48:53Speaker 04

  She was so intelligent, so dynamic. She fought for her throne. She believed in female monarchy. She set up in such great ways, having, you know, both sides on her council, and yet she lost everything in the most tragic, horrific way. Many queens are treated badly. I would say no monarch in history has been treated as badly as Mary, Queen of Scots. It's not the same as losing in battle. It is a woman who, the people around her, she thought they were her friends and they betrayed her over and over again. And finally, they all agreed. They signed a contract that one of their lot could sexually assault her and that is the ultimate betrayal.

• 49:36Matt Forde?

  Huge thanks to Professor Kate Williams. Alice, what do you have for me next week?

• 49:40Alice Levine?

  Okay, we're going to zoom forward 400 years to a naughties cultural phenomenon.

• 49:45Matt Forde?

  MSN messenger.

• 49:47Alice Levine?

  Iconic, but no.

• 49:48Matt Forde?

  Uh, Skins on E4.

• 49:51Alice Levine?

  Oh my God, those teenagers were feral. It was a scandal, but unfortunately not.

• 49:55Matt Forde?

  Woolworths and pick a mix culture.

• 49:58Alice Levine?

  The licorice all sorts story. I mean, we should do it. Uh, no, I'm going to be telling you the story of Jade Goody, the Bermondsey-born dental nurse that became one of the most famous people in Britain overnight. And then it all came crashing down in a storm of scandal and racism. And then she did something no one saw coming, saved lives in the process.

• 50:17Matt Forde?

  This will be so good. I've hoped that we'd cover this for ages because it hits so many different parts of modern British culture and reality TV. And it feels like a really modern British scandal.

• 50:27Alice Levine?

  Couldn't agree more.

• 50:28Matt Forde?

  From Audible and Samistat Audio, this was the final episode in our series, Warring Queens. You've been listening to British Scandal, an Audible original. British Scandal is hosted by me, Matt Ford.

• 50:39Alice Levine?

  And me, Alice Levine.

• 50:40Matt Forde?

  For Samistat, our series producer was Chika Ayers. Our assistant producer was Louise Mason. Our senior producers were Joe Sykes and Dasha Lisitzsina. Our engineer was Jai Williams. Executive producers for Audible were Theodora LaLoudis and Estelle Doyle.

• 51:01Speaker 07

  He lurks in shadow. He slips into dreams. He casts no reflection. Audible presents Bram Stoker's Dracula: How You've Never Heard It Before, with a new full cast audio thriller starring Jonathan Bailey as Dracula, Ella Purnell as Mina Harker, and an A-list cast, including Maggie Gyllenhaal as Van Helsing, Amy Lou Wood as Lucy, David Johnson as Dr. Seward, and many more. When Mina's fiance Jonathan Harker vanishes in Transylvania, Mina pieces together letters, diary entries, and chilling testimony to hunt the predator

• 51:40Speaker 07

  stalking those she loves, only to discover Dracula's already hunting her. Audible's Dracula invites you to welcome literature's most shadowy figure into your home. Listen to the new audiobook adaptation of Bram Stoker's Dracula, only on Audible.

• 52:01Matt Forde?

  Hi, I'm Kenya Barris.

• 52:02Speaker 06

  And I'm Malcolm Gladwell. We're back for season two of our Audible original podcast, The Unusual Suspects.

• 52:08Matt Forde?

  We'll sit down with extraordinary guests from the worlds of art, film, literature, comedy, and wellness to hear from their unexpected stories of success.

• 52:16Speaker 06

  And who do we have this season? Well, we'll talk with Grammy-winning artist Anderson Paak, athlete Rich Roll, portrait artist Amy Sherald, Oscar-winning director Ron Howard, legendary writer David Sedaris, and many more. These conversations are more intimate than last season, wouldn't you say?

• 52:32Matt Forde?

  I would. Listen to season one of The Unusual Suspects wherever you get your podcasts, and sign up for a free trial Audible to listen to season two in the Audible app or by subscribing to Apple Podcasts.

• 52:49Speaker 07

  There are books that change how you see the world, and there are books that change how you see yourself. In a new podcast series, A Great Book with Barack Obama, President Obama sits down with a series of surprising and sharp guests to explore six books that have shaped his life and perspective on the world. From Song of Solomon and The Fire Next Time, to All the Pretty Horses and Gilead, the president is joined by guests like Tom Hanks and Ta-Nehisi Coates to reflect on how these timeless stories shaped his thinking on everything from fatherhood to leadership, and discover together what they tell us about the world we live in and the world we want to create.

• 53:32Speaker 07

  Audible subscribers can listen to all episodes of A Great Book with Barack Obama ad-free right now, plus access each audiobook discussed in the series. Download the Audible app today.