Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough, was a woman with a `passion for government': a compulsion to wield power not only in her own family but in public affairs as well. She was the favourite of Queen Anne, the devoted wife and political associate of the Queen's most powerful subject, the passionate ally or bitter enemy of most of the leading public figures of her day, and in her widowhood the effective head of one of England's great families. Despite her stormy relationship with the architect Vanbrugh, she played a major role in the building of Blenheim Palace, one of England's most splendid houses. Born in 1660, she succeeded during the course of her long life in overcoming many of the contemporary constraints on her sex. Her sheer force of personality made her one of the most influential, as well as one of the most loved and hated, of Augustan women.

This is the first complete scholarly biography of the Duchess of Marlborough. Frances Harris makes full use of recently available manuscript sources to tell the colourful story of a woman at the centre of power, whose life spanned more than eighty years from the Restoration to the fall of Walpole. Dr Harris sets Sarah's life and personal relationships in the context of her time, drawing a vivid portrait of a woman whose character and life are as fascinating and contentious today as they were to her contemporaries.