The English Governess at the Siamese Court - Anna Leonowens

In 1862, the enlightened King Mongkut of Siam engaged an Englishwoman, Anna Leonowens, to be a teacher of his children. She was eminently suited to the role, being young, adventurous, and interested in the people among whom she had chosen to live. But she and the King did not see eye to eye in the domestic sphere: he, for the first time in his life, had met a woman who dared to contradict him, while Mrs Leonowens found the idea of male domination intolerable. Mam,’ he said, after one of their squabbles, ‘you are one great difficulty’, and she remained in his service for only five and a half years before resigning. The reader may be surprised that the King endured her moralizing attitudes for quite so long!

Mrs Leonowens published The English Governess at the Siamese Court in 1870 and some eighty years later it was to inspire the book and the film ‘Anna and the King of Siam’, and the musical The King and I’, reinterpretations which caused offence to the Thai people because of their caricature of a still greatly venerated king. Mrs Leonowens’ book, however, placed in the context of its time, remains engaging as a story of adventure, fascinating as a picture of Siam little more than a century ago, and intriguing as an account of King Mongkut’s private life. One needs to be warned, however, not to believe all that she wrote: sometimes her vivid imagination took charge of her pen and, like many Victorian ladies, she was always ready to expect the worst.