ABSTRACT
Chapter 4 questions how the private life of monarchy increasingly became open to public discussion, bookended by two moments of royal scandal at St. James’s Palace: the birth of James Francis Edward Stuart in 1688 and the birth of Princess Augusta Frederica to Frederick, Prince of Wales, in 1737. The juxtaposition of these different political moments just under 50 years apart highlights crucial changes that had occurred in the representation of royalty and the construction of monarchical authority in England. The expansion of print and newspapers after the permanent end of licensing in 1695 amplified the activities of the court, providing new opportunities for the creation of political celebrity and the experience of loyalism among subjects, often expressed through the language of affect. Reconstructing the wider discursive and affective context within which commercial royal images circulated, this chapter contributes to a growing body of scholarship that emphasizes the importance of loyalty conceptualized through the languages of emotion. It also considers how amatory histories of the court published during this period further domesticated the monarchy by offering readers the emotional lives of royalty for narrative consumption.
