Just finished. Loved it.What's not to love about the dastardly Tudors? I've been quite fascinated by the Tudors ever since I saw The Six Wives of Henry VIII on the ABC all.those.years.ago. Hard to believe it first aired in 1970...
I haven't read The Other Boleyn Girl but I did watch the movie the other day. It made me mad. Mainly because I found that version of the Boleyn Girls not at all believable. As a result I don't want to read the other books, or that one, in fact.
History, they say, is written by the victors so we may never know what really went on except what we can interpret from diaries that have survived and stories written after the fact. However, I found that Hillary Mantel's version painted a sumptuous picture of Tudor times that made me want to believe her story over the other stories.
Ms Mantel questioned the general view of the main characters in the Tudor drama: How could a man who rose from being a Blacksmith's son to the right hand of Henry VIII and who could just as make a pair of fairy wings for his daughter as draft legislation for parliament be all bad (Thomas Cromwell)? And how could a man who put to the fire, the block and the rack men and women who believed the bible should be able to be read by the average Englishman or woman be all good (Thomas More)?
Wolf Hall is a fictional treatment of Henry VIII's separation from Rome, divorce from Katherine of Aragon and marriage to Anne Boleyn from the point of view of Thomas Cromwell a commoner who rose to be the second most powerful man in England after the King.
This is not a book to read when tired. It is important to read every word and the character guide at the beginning is a helpful addition. Half the time it is difficult to dissect who is talking. Ms Mantel writes sparsely but not at all neatly. A style which, in fact, helps to convey the complexity of the times.
I read this accompanied by my A-Z of London Streets. Some sort of encyclopedia of British Royalty would also have helped.
I am very much looking forward to the next installment.
11 comments:
I have that in my to be read pile. My friend whose copy I have borrowed said much the same as you.
I LOVE Hilary Mantel's Learning to Talk and enjoyed Beyond Black, but the rest of her back catalogue seems unavailable. I don't have the time to read Wolf Hall at the moment, but I am hoping that its success spurs publishers into rereleasing her earlier works. She seems to be an adventurous and chameleon-like author.
I read The Other Boleyn Girl and just cannot get a handle on fictionalised history at all. I don't see the point of it.
That being said, what you say about this author questioning the badness of Cromwell and the goodness of More is intriguing.
Great review. I have read so many Tudor novels but think this will be superior. Will bump it up on my "to read" list.
I have a friend who went to a school named after Thomas More.
I so want to read this book, especially as I found the Phillipa Gregory ones a bit lame. Page turners, but lame. I've blogged about it before.
This book sounds fantastic. I'm such a sucker for all things Tudor.
Most interesting to read the post and all the comments. Can't say the book did anything for me. It won a big prize but seems to fall into the Marmite (British Vegemite) category ie. either loved or hated. I fell in the middle certainly not loving it but not exactly hating it either. Found it a chore to get through and glad when I finished. We know so much about the Tudors and there is so much written, filmed and T,V,'d about that period that this didn't add anything new for me and I found that style of writing cold and quite boring. It's too minimal for me. HofNanu felt much the same and we don't often agree about books. Having said that, my neighbour loved it and she has a 1st in history from Oxford. Beyond Black was adapted for radio in 5 parts and very well executed but didn't make me want to rush to read the original. Just as well we all like different books or few people would be able to make a living from writing. Haven't read any others and this experience isn't encouraging me to rush to do so.
You know, I ordered this one in from the library - and then, sadly, couldn't get into it. I'd like to try again another time though...
It sounds interesting...but given the size of the current piles beside my bed, I'm narrowing my historical fiction reading to the 19th Century. Totally arbitrary...but I have to organise things somehow. Maybe next year will be my Tudor year?
My mum is reading this at the moment and I have told her that if I am not the first person she lends it to I will be VERY disappointed. I may even remove grandchild visiting privileges.
I love a good reccomendation - thanks for that. My wish list groweth...
No-one else has said it yet, so I will: there was a reason Eric Bana couldn't save the movie: it was LAME.
The book however, was so much better ... but the series itself was lacking - I loved this book, but not the others ( *yawn* )
I hate the Tudors though, I hadn't done a lot of reading before visiting London, and the reason I hate them is that I want to re-visit all those FAB palaces etc, but with my history in mind ... *sigh* .. such fabulous, fabulous ( scary ) history..
xx
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