There were many great families in Tudor, England, but among them, none except perhaps the

Howard's rivaled the Dudley's for their dramatic seesawing between high favour and low

disgrace.

Every Tudor monarch made their name with a Dudley by their side or by crushing one beneath

their feet, so is today's guest.

Think of Edmund Dudley, who enriched Henry VII and was executed by Henry VIII, John Dudley,

Duke of Northumberland, who helped Edward VI rule, put Lady Jane Grey on the throne and

died a traitor's death under Mary, and Robert Dudley, Elizabeth I Ami Ameru, and that's

before we've got to the women.

Yet their crucial family role in the Tudor story has never been told before.

But today's guest has done just that in her new book The House of Dudley, a new history

of Tudor England.

She is Dr. Joanne Paul, who is senior lecturer in early modern history at the University of

Sussex, a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society, and a BBC New Generation thinker.

She's also appeared on not just the Tudors before, in an episode called Bloody Massacres

and the Puritan Poet.

Dr. Paul has published books on Thomas Moore and Council and Command in Early Modern England,

but The House of Dudley is her first book for a general audience, and it's a corker.

Well, first of all, I want to congratulate you on this book, because it is a real triumph.

I think it is really beautifully and evocatively written.

You have produced a really gripping narrative history book, and you are talking about a

family who are so important to the Tudors strangely.

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