Tangled Souls: Love and Scandal Among the Victorian Aristocracy

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The glittering, poignant and often shocking story of the love affair between two members of a group of unconventional aristocrats at the heart of late Victorian society.

Outrageously handsome, witty and clever, Harry Cust was reputed to be one of the great womanisers of the late Victorian era. In 1893, while a Member of Parliament, he caused public scandal by his affair with artist and poet Nina Welby Gregory. When she revealed she was pregnant, horror swept through their circle known as ‘the Souls’, a cultured, mostly aristocratic group of writers, artists and politicians who also rubbed shoulders with luminaries such as Oscar Wilde and H.G. Wells.

With the unconventional Margot Tennant and philosopher-statesman Arthur Balfour at their centre, the dazzling Souls eschewed the formalities of upper-class etiquette, valuing conversation and clever games above gambling and racing. Talented and glamorous women such as Violet Granby and Ettie Grenfell joined rising politicians George Curzon and George Wyndham at grand country houses to talk, play and flirt.

Passions raged behind their courtly code. Married Souls discreetly bore their lovers’ children – and public figures got away with much worse – yet bachelor Harry’s seduction of a single woman of the same class broke the rules. For the rest of their lives, Harry and Nina would fight to rebuild their reputations and maintain the marriage they were pressurised to enter.

In Tangled Souls, acclaimed biographer Jane Dismore tells the tumultuous story of the romance which threatened to tear apart this distinguished group of friends, revealing pre-war society at its most colourful and most conflicted.

AUTHOR:
Jane Dismore is a biographer and history writer. Her books include Tangled Souls: Love and Scandal among the Victorian Aristocracy; Princess: The Early Life of Queen Elizabeth II (a source for the ITV and PBS documentary Our Queen at War); and Duchesses: Living in 21st Century Britain, the first book to examine the lives of today’s non-royal duchesses. She writes features for a wide range of publications and has appeared on television, radio and in podcasts. Jane is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society and a member of the Society of Authors, the Biographers’ Club and the Biographers International Organisation. A former teacher and practising solicitor, she lives in Hertfordshire.

ISBN: 9781837053544
Author: DISMORE, JANE
Format: Paperback
Publication date: 01/12/2026
RRP: $42.99
Imprint: The History Press