The Queen's Frog Prince

Lee David

Between the years 1579 and 1581, a courtship between Elizabeth I of England and François, Duke of Anjou took place. Though this courtship is often dismissed as a political tactic on Elizabeth's part to create an Anglo-French alliance during the Wars of Religion, The Queen's Frog Prince presents an alternative interpretation. In this book, David Lee pores over some of the surviving love letters exchanged between Elizabeth and Anjou, whom Elizabeth affectionately nicknamed “my frog.” Lee suggests that although the courtship suited Elizabeth I politically, it also blossomed into something much more complex, an affectionate bond, and that to understand Elizabeth I as a woman, she must first be seen for who she was beneath all the vainglory and iconography.