By 1784, for one, Georgiana owed "many, many, many thousands," and her creditors dogged her until her death.īiographer Amanda Foreman describes astutely the mess that surrounded the personal relationships of the aristocratic subculture (Georgiana and the duke engaged for many years in a ménage à trois with Lady Elizabeth Fraser, who inveigled her way into the duke's bed and the duchess's heart). But her weaknesses marked the last part of her life. By turns she was caricatured and fawned on by the press, and she provided the inspiration for the character of Lady Teazle in Richard Sheridan's famous play The School for Scandal. The duchess was an intimate of ministers and princes, and she canvassed assiduously for the Whig cause, most famously in the Westminster election of 1784. Nonetheless, she quickly moved from a world dominated by social parties to one focused on political parties. She was beautiful, sensitive, and extravagant-drugs, drink, high-profile love affairs, and even gambling counted among her favorite leisure-time activities. She came from one of England's richest and most landed families (the late Princess Diana was a Spencer too) and married into another. Georgiana Spencer was, in a sense, an 18th-century It Girl.
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