Sir Walter Ralegh

Explorer, pirate, poet, scientist and historian, Sir Walter Ralegh represents to many the epitome of Elizabethan man. His career follows a colourful and exciting course, from his humble beginnings on a Devon farm, through the 1580s when he dazzled Elizabeth and her Court, to the long, sad years of his disgrace and downfall. Robert Lacey has uncovered new evidence concerning Ralegh's private life, of his love for the Irish girl, Alice Goold, and his care for their illegitimate child, of his secret marriage to Bess Throckmorton, and of his attempted suicide in the Tower.
Yet any life of Ralegh must, above all, be a story of adventure, of a vast fortune made through the courtship of his Queen and lost though his marriage to one of het ladies-in-waiting; of daring exploits against the Spaniards; of hardship and tragedy in Virginia; the desperate search amid the swamps of the Orinoco for El Dorado, the fabulous city of gold; and his final gallant return to face James I and certain death.
In this scholarly yet compulsively readable biography, the life of one of history's most colourful characters is told with vigour, sympathy and understanding.