The Bridport Literary Festival 2018

Devices & Desires
Kate Hubbard

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Born in 1521, Bess of Hardwick, property tycoon, businesswoman, money-lender and four-times wife, lived an astonishing eighty-seven years. Through canny choices and a will of steel, she rose from country squire’s daughter
to a Dowager Countess, establishing herself as one of the most influential women in England. Her passion was for building and Bess kept an eye on every stage of the creation of her four houses – including Hardwick New Hall, her sole surviving home. In this new biography, Kate Hubbard, examines Bess’s life as a builder which echoed her triumphant progress through Elizabethan England.