William Wallace: The King's Enemy

by D.J. Gray

A biography of Sir William Wallace, one of the greatest heroes in the story of Scotland's battle for freedom from England, and remembered today as the architect of Scottish independence. This book is also an attempt to offer an insight into the mind of a modern day freedom fighter.

Genres: History, Biography, Scotland, Nonfiction, Medieval, Biography Memoir, British Literature

173 pages, Hardcover

First published February 1, 1991

Reviews

[Samuel Snoek-Brown]

This is in places an engaging read, as Gray's passion for her subject is evident everywhere. But what makes it engaging in some places makes it amateurish in others, because Gray's biases too often color her historical objectivity. She often openly ignores documented fact -- or the lack thereof -- in order to speculate on the emotions and thought processes not only of Wallace, but also of Robert the Bruce, Edward I, and many other figures key to the war for Scottish independence. She also relies heavily on folkloric sources like the Wallace-idolizing Harry the Blind, who Gray admits is biased but to whom Gray refers more than any other source. The book's organization leaves much to be desired, too; it reads more like a masters thesis than a carefully vetted work of professional scholarship. A good effort if Gray was indeed a grad student when she wrote this, but mostly, this book just makes me want to track down a more reliable source. Perhaps I made a mistake by reading this after Ronald McNair Scott's masterful treatment of Robert the Bruce.

[Beth]

Set in Scotland. 173 pp. This is really more a description of the battles that Wallace and others fought rather than a biography of the man. Saying that, it was incredibly dry reading, and it was a challenge to keep plodding through it. Nothing about this book captured the spirit and passion of Wallace.

Read online at https://archive.org/details/williamwa...

William Wallace: The King's Enemy by D.J. Gray

**The copy of the hardback I have has this cover:

[Lisa]

Although very informative, this book was very dryly presented. It was hard to plow through and could have used a couple more maps to help understand the basic areas of Scotland that were being discussed. Because of that I gave it 2 stars.

[Daniel]

This book flipped from early Middle Ages European textbook to hagiography of William Wallace to polemic against King Edward. The book is very clearly biased against England and toward Scotland, and while it does take the time to address the lack of reliable documentary evidence, it will frequently accept at face value anything that remotely makes Wallace look good. It’ll even make assumptions that are unsubstantiated by any reliable source (according to the author), such as Wallace being a strong, tall, attractive young man, never having a moment of weakness, and single handedly defeating multiple armed opponents without a weapon. I know his story inspires legend, but this book didn’t even do a good job of telling the story—it was quite disjointed and dry despite the exaggerated stories. Not my favorite “history” by a long shot.

[Andrew Kosztyo]

No book about a personal forebearer can be bad.

[Yuzacc]

This book is one of the most BORING books I have ever read! If I were you, I would not waste my time reading this book!

[Len Knighton]

Too many far-away places with strange sounding names.

[Kat]

Such a sad story, and brutal times.