An evening with Sarah Dunant

Join award-winning historical writer and broadcaster Sarah Dunant as she discusses her new book The Marchesa, a history of the magnificent Isabella d’Este.

Born in 1474, the Marchioness of Mantua Isabella d’Este ran a famed court as a powerful artistic patron, a fashion icon and a cunning political operator. She left behind a magnificent collection of paintings, sculptures, books, instruments, and curiosities, long since lost or dispersed.

What little remains includes the treasure trove of her correspondence - thousands of letters preserved in a deconsecrated church and convent, which house the State Archive of the city of Mantua.

Inside the State Archive, the opinionated ghost of Isabella begins a conversation with a scholar come to study her. Together, they resurrect a tumultuous life, from precocious daughter of a Duke and teenage wife to the Marchese of Mantua, to a formidable court consort, collector and political player, instrumental in guiding the state through the vicissitudes of the Italian wars. A powerful, flamboyant woman who, while constrained by the conventions of her age, steered her way through them with uncommon tenacity and skill.