Finding Joan Beaufort

The last couple of weeks have been spent debating whether I could actually write a book about Joan Beaufort. Given my lifetime of imposter syndrome I can think of many reasons why I shouldn’t. However at my stage of life there is a strong argument there is nothing to loose and I might actually enjoy it.

So I have accumulated a pile of biographies, a jumble of documents from the National Archives and a whole host of other potentially useful records.

It is clear at this stage that planning is going to be the most important part of the whole project.

It’s tempting to rush into writing, but with Joan that simply isn’t going to work. She isn’t a figure with a ready-made narrative. More often, she appears briefly—through family connections, landholdings, or the actions of others—before disappearing again. So the first  has to be to take a step back andthink carefully about how her story can be told.

At the moment, my focus is on shaping the approach rather than drafting chapters. Do I follow a

straightforward chronological structure, or build the book around themes—power, land, family,

widowhood? Joan sits at the centre of all of these, but rarely in a way that is obvious at first glance.

A lot of this stage is about mapping: identifying where she appears in the records, and just as

importantly, where she doesn’t. That means working through sources and resisting the temptation to write yet, but to understand the landscape I’m dealing with.Place is also feeding into the planning. 

Locations such as Raby Castle and Lincoln Cathedral are helping me think about structure. These aren’t just settings—they may well become anchors for different parts of the book.

I’m also very aware of what I don’t want to do. Joan is too often reduced to a supporting

role—daughter of Katherine Swynford, or matriarch of a family caught up in the Wars of the Roses. I need to find a way to keep her at the centre, even when the story of those around her take centre stage.

So for now, this is slow, deliberate work. No dramatic breakthroughs, just building a framework that feels honest to the evidence. If I get this stage right, the writing should follow