Earlier today I read about Lady Jane Grey, the "nine days queen" who ascended the English throne at sixteen. It was the first sort of autobiographical literature this semester that really fascinated me! From her biographies and personal letters I gathered that, she...
...was well-educated
"I found her in her chamber reading Phaedon Platonis in Greek, and that with as much delight as some gentleman would read a merry tale in Boccaccio." --excerpt from Roger Ascham's Schoolmaster
...was bold
In a letter rebuking her former tutor for renouncing his faith, "Why dost thou now show thyself most weak, when indeed thou oughtest to be most strong? The strength of a fort is unknown before the assault: but thou yieldest thy hold before any battery be made. O wretched and unhappy man, what art thou, but dust and ashes? and wilt thou resist thy maker that fashioned and framed thee?"
...cared about her family
