MATILDA OF ARGYLL is a bold and dramatic adventure, ripped from the pages of history, seen through the eyes and told from the heart of those who lived through this epic period. Historian Sarah Chloe Burns reaches back in time to recap the blending of French and English royalty following William the Conqueror’s victory at the Battle of Hastings (1036 A.D.). Chapter one begins with a conversation which might have occurred between his granddaughter Matilda and her husband—Geoffrey Plantagenet—in Angers, France (1136 A.D.). The true story of this historic Matilda sets the backdrop for a dramatic tale which could have connected her bloodline to the future, fictional Matilda of Argyll. As Matilda Campbell’s story begins in1638, this high-spirited and intelligent nineteen-year-old Scot is unwilling to accept society’s rules and barriers regarding gender and class. Her penchant for independent thinking will take her far—eventually across the ocean to Jamestown, Virginia—but at what cost? There, she will witness race and class distinction of a manner she could never have imagined. Stretching from London City, England to the Scottish Highlands; from Mali, Africa to the West Indies, the story lines of Scottish, English and African peoples of many classes will intersect in an intensely dramatic fashion. What makes Matilda a truly entertaining and enlightening experience is the manner in which Burns weaves the pages of recorded history, and the footsteps of those who made that history, with her colorful fictional characters.
- Steven Carter, Ph.D. HR HR “A few years ago, I had the pleasure of being part of a gathering of scholars interested in women’s history as part of the Oxford Round Table. It was there that I met Sarah Chloe Burns. When she asked me to write a Foreword for Matilda of Argyll, I accepted immediately, knowing what a welcome contribution Sarah’s book would make to the field of women’s studies. Those of us engaged in Women’s History realize that much of our work involves reading and interpreting the silences. The story of women and their place in society over the ages is often called the underside of history. In her new edition of Matilda of Argyll, Sarah has once again managed to weave vast slices of recorded history with the stories of fictional characters who are richly and lovingly drawn. The work of revising, the painful task of letting go of some cherished sections of the original while expanding the historical context, has yielded an eminently readable and engaging story. Sarah continues to help a wider audience to appreciate this important but still under-explored dimension in the evolving story of humanity.” |
Historian Sarah Chloe Burns has gained an international reputation as a noted research academic in the area of gender and race relations, cross-culturally, from the ancient period to the present. Her graduate work was recognized and rewarded by the Phi Alpha Theta History Honor Society, and one of her first orders of business as a teaching historian was to create a Women’s History survey course for Bakersfield College (the first of its kind). She has presented her findings to civic and academic groups, the American Association of University Women, within college and professional newspapers, scholarly journals, and abroad. She was a member and presenter at the Oxford Roundtable on Human Rights and Gender Discrimination (March 30-April 4, 2003), a presenter at the Second International Conference on European History, From Ancient to Modern, in Athens, Greece (Dec. 29-31, 2004). The article prepared for the Athens conference is entitled, “Mothering Mother Earth; the Path of the Nurturing Matriarch from Ancient Greece to the 19th Century Parisian Salon,” and was published in the conference journal entitled, Themes in European History: Essays from the 2nd International Conference on European History. Ms. Burns is also a member (Reader) of the Bodleian Library, Oxford University, 
England, and a member of the Organization of American Historians since 1996. Her biography is featured annually in the Marquis’s Who’s Who—of American Women; in American Education; in America; and in the World, as well as the National Register’s Who’s Who in Executives and Professionals.
Ms. Burns is currently an Adjunct Professor of History at College of the Canyons, Santa Clarita, California, as well as National University. Her past faculty positions include Adjunct Professor of History with the Bakersfield College History Department and part-time Lecturer with the History Department of California State University, Bakersfield. Her first book, Daughters of Juno, Chronicle I; Matilda of Argyll, was published in March of 2004 by Pentland Press, North Carolina. She has contributed chapters to two books in the Wake Up Live The Life You Love series: On An Enlightened Path and With Gratitude. As the revised edition of this book, Matilda of Argyll, is being published by University Press of the South, she is currently occupied with creating another historic fiction. Visit her other website at http://www.history4sale.com, or email her at scburns@bak.rr.com.
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