Henrietta Temple

Henrietta Temple is the ninth novel written by Benjamin Disraeli, who would later become a Prime Minister of Britain. Background Disraeli wrote the first volume of Henrietta Temple in 1833 at the start of his affair with Henrietta Sykes, on whom the novel’s eponymous heroine is based, and completed it three years later, shortly after the affair had ended. The two volumes reflect these two stages of the relationship, the first with, "the rustle of real petticoats [being] more audible than in any other part of Disraeli's work," the latter where, "passion has vanished". The novel was written at a time when Disraeli was heavily in debt (ca £1m in today’s terms) and its limited success helped ease Disraeli’s financial situation. Synopsis