This map shall provide locations that are significant in The Fortunes of Perkin Warbeck and chronicle the travels of supporting characters in the novel. The significance of these locations and events impact the narrative and storyline within the novel and will help to provide a visual comparison with Mary Shelley's other works. In this novel, Mary Shelley returned to The Last Man's message that an idealistic political system is impossible without an improvement in human nature.[2] This historical novel, influenced by those of Sir Walter Scott,[3] fictionalises the exploits of Perkin Warbeck, a pretender to the throne of King Henry VII who claimed to be Richard, Duke of York, the second son of King Edward IV.
Shelley believed that Warbeck really was Richard and had escaped from the Tower of London.[4] She endows his character with elements of Percy Shelley, portraying him sympathetically as "an angelic essence, incapable of wound", who is led by his sensibility onto the political stage.[5] She seems to have identified herself with Richard's wife, Lady Katherine Gordon, who survives after her husband's death by compromising with his political enemies.[6]
Lady Gordon stands for the values of friendship, domesticity and equality; through her, Mary Shelley offers a female alternative to the masculine power politics that destroy Richard, as well as the typical historical narrative which only relates those events.[7]
Shelley also creates a strong female character in the round-faced, half-Moor, half-Fleming, Monina de Faro, Richard's adoptive sister, whom Robin Clifford demands as his wife. Monina is a versatile young lady who acts as decoy, messenger, and military organizer, in addition to her close friendship with both Richard and Katherine. Robin Clifford epitomizes mixed loyalties—an old friend descended from Lancastrians, who is constantly divided against himself. Stephen Frion, secretary to Henry VII and betrayed by him, is an elder foil, whose loyalties shift back and forth dependent on Henry's grace, whereas Clifford's wavering is based on genuine emotion (https://www.wikiwand.com/en/The_Fortunes_of_Perkin_Warbeck).
