8.2 /10 1 Votes
Cover artist Arthur Barbosa Language English Publication date 1970 Followed by Flash for Freedom! Page count 256 | 4.1/5 Goodreads Country United Kingdom Publisher Barrie & Jenkins Originally published 1970 Preceded by Flashman Genre Historical Fiction | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Media type Print (Hardback & Paperback) Similar George MacDonald Fraser books, Flashman Papers Series books, Fiction books | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Royal flash 1975 trailer
Royal Flash is a 1970 novel by George MacDonald Fraser. It is the second of the Flashman novels. It was made into the film Royal Flash in 1975 and remains the only Flashman novel to be filmed.
Contents
Plot summary
Royal Flash is set during the Revolutions of 1848. The story features Lola Montez and Otto von Bismarck as major characters, and fictionalises elements of the Schleswig-Holstein Question, 1843, 1847 and 1848. It is set in the fictional Duchy of Strackenz, making it the only Flashman novel to be set in a fictitious location.
Other characters include:
The book is loosely based on the plot of The Prisoner of Zenda. Flashman explains that this is because the story was plagiarised from him by its author, Anthony Hope. In a letter, Fraser wrote that during his researches into an earlier Flashman book he had discovered that in real life Bismark and Lola Montez had been in London at the same time. He added that it had been too good an opportunity to miss.