Interview: Lucy Worsley
The author of Courtiers: The Secret History of Kensington Palace (Faber & Faber), and presenter of the BBC TV series, If Walls Could Talk: An Intimate History of the Home discusses her work with Paul Lay.
What inspired you to write Courtiers?
I work as the chief curator at Kensington Palace and would often find myself walking up the King’s Grand Staircase there and wondering about the identities of the 45 people painted on its walls. William Kent in the 1720s decorated the staircase with a group portrait of servants from the lower ranks of the royal household. I used to hear all sorts of conflicting stories about who was who and finally decided to work it out as definitively as possible. Four years later, the result was Courtiers.
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