This is a surprisingly good book. I got hold of it before a trip to the middle east, thinking it might provide some 'colour' (which it did) but it gave much more than that.
The story of an upper class British woman, Jane Digby, born in the early 1800s who failed to fit the mould. She married young (as expected) but got bored and took lovers (possibly expected) with who she fell madly in love (certainly not expected). She also failed to be discreet and her husband, an MP divorced her in an era where a divorce decree was an Act of Parliament. The details were so salacious that the Time moved the coverage of the divorce to the front page of the paper (and this was before the Murdochs owned the paper!).
Jane was effectively banished from the UK and lived the balance of her long and interesting life in Europe and the middle east. There was a succession of passionate love affairs with important people, most of which ended badly. Her final romance was a 20+ year marriage to a bedouin Sheikh in Syria, which involved living part of the year with her husband on camelback.
The author has access to a wealth of information, including detailed diaries kept by the subject. Later family members bowdlerised small parts of the record (it is hard to imagine what would have been more lurid or explicit than the details that remained) but Digby was of such prominence that her life was also well recorded by others.
The author manages to tell the story of the life without injecting her views or judgements. The reader is thus able to reflect, without being led, on the actions of Digby. Had she lived in the late 20th century, her life would have seemed unremarkable. A highly intelligent and highly passionate woman who loved too much and too unwisely would not attract too much attention.
I was fascinated. Digby must have been a wonderfully strong personality, and I feel privileged to be able to know about life.
Read July 2015. ( )

Most interesting. ( )

Author Mary S. Lovell
Title Bio of Jane Digby
Illustrator None
Publisher Fourth Estate
Date 2003
Pages 384

Summary: Jane was one of the most remarkable women in the 19th century. She survived divorce and was the mistress to the Kings before finding love in the deserts of the Middle East. Jane was born on April 3rd 1807 in Dorset at Minterne Magna. She was the daughter of Admiral Henry Digby and Jane Elizabeth Coke.

Tags and subject headings is 19th century, British, and Bedouin.

My Response: Okay I learned that this lady had a hard life because her divorce it says was scandalous. But I also learned that she was very important in this century that was forever ago. This book was on okay book. I am not real big on biographies of any kind though. ( )

What a fascinating woman Jane Digby was. She was married several times and involved with several other men as lovers in a very unusual 19th century life. She was also a competent manager of her property and various households and a kind and loving friend and relative, keeping in a cordial relationship with former husbands and with a family who were disgraced by her behavior. Her final decades married to a Bedouin sheik in Syria would be an unlikely fiction if not true. She was an extraordinary woman, not just for her time, but for any time. ( )

Born into nobility, Jane Digby was raised to be a lady but ended up living a life full of adventure, love, and scandal for the 1800s public. Her name was one that became legendary, synonymous with scandal and breaking the rules of society. Married as a teenager, her husband was too busy for her resulting in her finding love elsewhere. This search for love would be a lifetime adventure that would lead from England, to France, Germany, Italy, and finally Damascus. The lover of lords, barons, kings, and sheiks among others hers was a life about love, desire, and fulfillment.

Mary Lovell has thoroughly researched Ms Digby's life - calling on her surviving relatives for access to Jane's diaries, letters, paintings, and sketches. In the bits and pieces that have been left behind for posterity, Ms Lovell has succeeded in writing a fascinating account of a life lived outside of society's boundaries. Her writing is enthralling and this biography was not only a page turner but one of real-life adventure. ( )