I notice, first thing, that it is written in the present tense. Ordinarily I do not like this, and I toss any book using present tense away because it seems gimmicky. However this time I will stick with it. I also have problems with the "he" pronoun. I am trying to stick to present tense in this short posting. It is hard to do! Does it not get tiresome to other readers?

I didn't have problems with the 'he' - I must have just automatically assumed it was Cromwell. This is interesting because things like this usually worry me - I have a lot of trouble, for instance, with books that don't use quotation marks or 'he said' 'she answered' kind of words.
I found the modern language sort of fitted. Cromwell struck me as a man so far ahead of his times, that the modern language subtly pushed that feeling. Too many 'forsooths' and 'ye olde' always make me think the author is trying too hard to position the book in the past, but most historical fiction that I read has at least some slightly archaic sentence construction.
Cromwell himself was much my favourite character, with his different personas for different places. I thought most of the characterisation was very good, and can't think at this time of one that was unconvincing (it is a while since I read it - didn't get a chance to reread in my hols *g*). Certainly Thomas More came off second best, but I'm not sorry because it's all his fault that Richard III has such a bad reputation. It was actually interesting to see him portrayed in such a different way.
Historical accuracy is so hard to judge. I feel the general happenings as I know them were accurate but it is all the little personal interactions that bring a book to life, and we can never know the truth at this distance. I like to just accept the interpretation that I like the best *g*
As for 'Wolf Hall', I realise it is the seat of the Seymours - is it meant to indicate that she will be Henry's most 'successful' queen? After all, Catherine Parr kept her head, but didn't do well in the baby stakes. (Personally, I've always thought Anne of Cleves was the big winner - kept in reasonable comfort and not having to put up with or worry about Henry).

I must start by saying it was nice to find a Booker prize winner that was 'readable', although a few snooty BBC literary critics were rather rude about Mantel not making Henry VIII enough of an 'aggressive' Tudor, but I imagine as another book is planned we might see the older and more belligerent Henry come to the fore. This should also explain the Wolf Hall title as presumable it being one of the estates of the Seymours, the story of Henry and Jane will lead in that direction . . . and maybe Jane and Cromwell, as doesn't he show an interest in her when he meets her as part of Ann Boleyn's household?
It is difficult to know how accurate Mantel's historical research is. No doubt the basic 'facts' are correct but much must hang on the emphasis given to the development of the characters.
For years it has been popularly held that Thomas More was a good and saintly man (and was in fact canonized in the 1930's). But it is now known that he was not beyond crucifying heretics at his Chelsea home. I don't know if they actually died or were just tortured and properly bumped-off later. And yes, I know this was a violent age and people expected to be treated harshly for their beliefs and it must have taken terrific courage or foolhardiness to defy the Church/King.
I felt Cromwell was shown as a well-rounded character, a loving husband and father, a fair master to his wards and servants, and a loyal servant himself to his master Wolsey and then the King. As the 'story' ends we begin to see that he is gradually surrounding himself with the trappings of success . . .his house is being extended, he takes on more servants, feeds more 'hangers-on' etc. I kept thinking "Hold on Thomas, don't get above yourself, there are plenty of noble courtiers who look down on you. As soon as you put a foot wrong they will be sticking their knives in."

Well, I might as well throw in a few of my own impressions.

I don't get the title at all. It's mentioned, what, three or four times in the whole book, and we never actually visit it at all; we're on the way there at the end. I'm not saying I could think of a better one, but it seems a bit abtruse....

It was only the second time I read the book that I realized that the book was really, effectively. in the first person. However, I don't think it would have worked as well as "I", so to speak. Not sure why...

I did like Cromwell, but I think it would have been a surprise if one didn't. I very much liked Wolsey - he came over as a thoroughly decent man, who loved and trusted the king for all his faults. He had some lovely lines - the one about if the king had only wanted something easy, like the philosopher's stone, made me smile.

It's perhaps a shame I watched the TV show The Tudors fairly recently - I had mental pictures of Wolsey, More and Henry as I'd seen them on TV. (But they fitted quite well - at least physically. Interestingly, I don't remember how Cromwell was shown in the TV show - I think he'd been made a more minor character.

I'm fairly sure a second book is planned - but I'm told that Hilary Mantel also planned a follow up to A Place of Greater Safety, her book about the French Revolution - which was published in 1992. So perhaps we shouldn't hold our collective breath...

Hmm, hmm, hmm. I thought I was all Tudored out, what with the sixteenth being the most over-studied, overexposed, and overdone century in the last millennium (with the nineteenth being a close second). I guess all it takes is a fresh voice and a little revisionism to get me interested again. Fiction-wise, in my opinion, Mantel's effort is so far above most of the crap that passes for historical novels these days that I can't help but wax a bit hysterical on the subject...

I still haven't read any of the other Booker contenders besides The Little Stranger, but so far I think the judges got right the awarding of their prize to Wolf Hall. I probably haven't liked a Booker winner this much since The Siege of Krishnapur.

Heh! Lydia, now that you mention it, I notice it's present tense. For some reason the tense seldom registers with me: perhaps because as soon as I've read something I automatically put it into the past tense. But perhaps it's the presentness that gives (gave) the narrative such immediacy and realness to me. I couldn't put my finger on exactly why I was so enthralled; but, Lydia, I think you may have suggested the reason.

I got lost in all the he/his/hims a few times, as well, but no worse than keeping all the Thomases straight. Sir Thomas Boleyn apparently had the same problem as me:
"Who's that?" Boleyn says. "In the corner there?"
The cardinal waves a hand. "Just one of my legal people."
"Send him out."
The cardinal sighs.
"Is he taking notes of this conversation?"
"Are you, Thomas?" the cardinal calls. "If so, stop it at once."
Half the world is called Thomas. Afterward, Boleyn will never be sure if it was him."Mantel's drollery often caught me and made me whoop!

Okay, since when has it become the vogue to knock off Sir Thomas More's halo? Well, why not...Richard III has been rehabilitated. A little counter-propaganda always makes things interesting.

I haven't watched anything about the Tudors for years now, so my mental pictures of Wolsey and Cromwell run to Orson Welles and Leo McKern -- but curiously not Robert Shaw for Henry VIII or Paul Scofield for More.

I guess that because so little is known about Cromwell's boyhood and early manhood that Mantel made the big leap from Cromwell leaving his home at Putney in 1500 to his appearance at Austin Friars in 1527. Is there really evidence that his father, Walter, abused Thomas and the rest of the family? It's interesting that Cromwell's sister Kat's husband was a Morgan Williams, yet Oliver Cromwell, the Protector, was descended from Kat. I'm fuzzy as to why the Williams name was dropped and Cromwell reacquired. I guess I need to look closer at the genealogies, but it's easier to ask: do any of you know why? :-)

As to the character that I like most: Liz or Lizzie Wykys, Cromwell's wife, seems to be someone that I would like to have known. I like the way Mantel portrays Katherine of Aragon too. She [Katherine] is standing...

Frieda, I had to look up the slight link between Thomas and Oliver Cromwell; as you suggest very tenuous and perhaps surprising that the family held onto the name after Thomas' fall from favour.
I think the habit of dropping a surname to take on one of a more illustrious relative has always gone on, especially where financial gain/titles are involved. There have been quite a few 'Royal by-blows' who have added, or where know as Fitzroy . . . no doubt hoping for some benefits to come their way.
I think Mantel has spoken of the fact that she had to 'invent' some of Cromwell's early life, as so little was known about him, although having him rise from the gutter is perhaps a tad far-fetched. Certainly courtiers of ancient and war-like ancestry looked down on many of the clever, but of relatively humble back-ground, employees of the Tudors.
The Wolf Hall I read was from the library, so am unable to quote anything and the old memory isn't what it once was. :-)

Vee, I found the passage in Wolf Hall about the name change. It's after Cromwell's wife and daughters died, and after his sister Kat and her husband Morgan died as well. Kat's sons, Richard and Walter, are taken in by Cromwell. They come to him and ask:
"So shall we change our name to yours?"
"You surprise me. The way things are with me, the people called Cromwell will be wanting to change their names to Williams."
"If I [Richard Williams] had your name, I should never disown it."
"Would your father like it? You know he believed he had his descent from Welsh princes."
Cromwell and his nephews continue discussing various aspects of their heredity and then Richard says:
"Every day I light a candle for my father."
"Does that help you?"
"No, I just do it."
"Does he know you do it?"
"I can't imagine what he knows. I know the living must comfort each other."
"This comforts me, Richard Cromwell." [emphasis mine]Was it that easy back then to change your name? -- what with all the other paperwork that Cromwell had to contend with: he didn't forget to make his will, after all.

I really like the way Mantel portrays Cromwell's feelings towards his family -- the sadness of his thinking about little "Grace who would have wanted a title...Lady Grace." And Anne (in whose coffin he had wanted to place her Greek grammar book) if she had lived she would have been promised to Rafe Sadler. But he had mixed feelings about his and Liz's son, Gregory. Perhaps the real Cromwell did have these sort of feelings...we will never know, of course; but it does give us a sense that Cromwell was something besides the cardinal's factotum; don't you think so?

Yes, I loved Cromwell's interaction with his family and those he looked after. It makes him seem so much less cunning than he is usually portrayed.

I do not know very much about Thomas Cromwell. He is usually only a bit player in the novels, plays and movies I have seen. It seemed in those that he was always out to take personal advantage of situations, whichever way the wind blew. Is that the way he is usually portrayed? Is that the conventional historical view of him?

I read in a review that Hilary Mantel wrote this book partly as a rebuttal to the impressions left on people by Robert Bolt the screenwriter's portrayal of Thomas More, Cromwell and Wolsey. Was Bolt a revisionist to suit his times? Why does Mantel think counter revisionism is in order now?

Friedag, the present tense thing glares out to me. It is interesting that you think it adds "immediacy and realness." It distracts me, especially at first but as I get used to it less so. I also think it is a first person account written in third person. This seems rather odd to me, but like martin_z I am not sure that the story would be told as effectively in either pure first person or third person. Offhand I cannot think of another novel that I have read that uses this first-in-third point of view. Does anyone know of another?

Lydia, I hoped that someone with more knowledge of the historical T. Cromwell would jump in, but I can take a stab at describing how he is usually perceived. It does seem that he was savvy in accessing personal gain -- at least to a point: he was an astute lawyer and businessman, for example, and he somehow insinuated himself, without antecedents, into intimacy with the cardinal and the king and others (including the Medici, maybe). But he also seems to have been loyal to a fault; e.g., Cromwell could have bailed on the cardinal but apparently didn't. History has painted him as cunning, as Kath said above in her post, but I gather that as a conniver he was certainly no worse than most of the aristocrats and royal hangers-on.

Thomas More, on the other hand, has been portrayed as a veritable saint since his martyrization (indeed, by some describers even before his death). Vee says he was canonized in the 1930s. Perhaps there were always naysayers, but the very act of making him a saint was/is enough to bring out the decriers -- such is the way of historians, I'm afraid: they can never leave any person or event to one interpretation (nor should they). :-)

It never occurred that there was something odd about the narrative style or point of view. I think I have read many stories written in such a way as Mantel did...but, of course, I can't think which ones right now. Wait, though: isn't Gone With the Wind pretty much "first-in-third point of view"? We readers are told most everything from Scarlett's perspective even though the story is told in omniscient third-person. Is that right? Good grief, as many times as I've read GWTW, I should be sure, but I'm not! Perhaps it's the definitions of the literary terminology that I'm fuzziest about -- it's been a long time since I studied the jargon.

lydia, Thomas Cromwell may appear to be a 'bit player' in Tudor history but there was so much dull background stuff going on at the time which doesn't make for the exciting TV/films we demand today.
When I 'did' the history of the sixteenth/seventeenth centuries (although I think we ran out of time by about the 1640's) Cromwell had just been upgraded as a major player in Reformation politics. Up 'til the 1960's it was always considered that it was Henry himself who had the idea of making himself the Head of the Church in England. Certainly he was intelligent and well-read (for a ruler of those days) but it needed a lawyer to work out the nitty gritty and to understand that Parliament could be used to draft the necessary legislation. Not much is made of this in WH, but you do get the feeling of long hours spent, either by emissaries travelling across Europe looking for Papal/Imperial support, or the searching of dusty tomes in legal libraries; all trying to make a case for the 'King's Great Matter'.
Isn't it interesting the 'sort' of people that were/still are made saints?
There is a interesting book by Christopher Hitchens The Missionary Position which shows Mother Teresa in quite a different light.
Thomas More seems to be of the school of 'The Way to Heaven is Through Suffering' both his own and other peoples. Some considered him to be pig-headed. I read an article about WH in which the book critic of the paper said how Cromwell was against the Catholic Thomas More. He seemed to forget that everyone in England at the time was a Catholic, being a 'Protestant' was very bad for the health for many more years.

Vee, as I recall, we American schoolkids were also taught that it was primarily Henry VIII who put into action the Dissolution of the Monasteries and turning England into a Protestant empire, with himself not only king but head of the church (all because he wanted a divorce so he could marry again and beget a legitimate male heir). Cromwell was put forth as "a great statesman" but what he did was seldom delineated (too convoluted and dull, as you say). He was most often referred to as the "framer" of modern England => Great Britain => United Kingdom and compared and contrasted with the "framers" of the U.S.A., Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson...that is, if he (Cromwell) was mentioned at all. I seriously doubt T. Cromwell is ever mentioned nowadays to most American students of world history before they are in college or university.

Frieda, I doubt that an English school pupil of today would know much about Cromwell/Henry VIII/Elizabeth I and even less about American history. Modern history is the thing.
I think it was under the reign of the young Edward VI that Protestantism took hold. And apropos Edward, I had always understood he was a sickly youth who finally succumbed to whatever it was he suffered from. It was when watching David Starkey or Simon Schama (sp) I learnt that he was a strong healthy boy who died after a short but nasty illness.

I had hoped to join in this discussion, however after receiving it from my local library, I weighed it up, not good for my wrists and did return. However I still look in on the discussion.
I did note that one of us did mention that it "was a brick"
so true.
I have a close friend who is about to start the book, I mentioned this discussion group that she can look in on when the time is right. She is an English lady so she will just love this book I am sure.

Thank you, friedag and veer. Your comments are fascinating and enlightening. They give me a springboard for adding to my own research. I was one of those students who did not hear of Thomas Cromwell until I was in college.

What do you mean, friedag, with your statement that the 16th century is "the most over-studied, overexposed, and overdone century in the last millennium"?

You may be right about "Gone with the Wind"'s perspective being similar. Right now all I can remember of it is "Scarlett O'Hara was not beautiful." :) But it is told in past tense, which I think most third person is. Maybe it is the present tense of "Wolf Hall" that makes it seem first person instead of pure third person. My knowledge of literary jargon is vague too, friedag.

I found "Wolf Hall" to be surprisingly easy to read in spite of the crowded cast of characters, most unfamiliar or only semi-familiar to me. However I am having a harder time formulating an opinion of what I really think of this book. Cromwell, the way Mantel writes of him, seems almost to have been a "superman" and More a sadist. Surely Mantel has swung too far in the other direction?

friedag, the "at least to a point" you refer to about Cromwell's acumen for personal gain would be his overreaching in enriching himself from the dissolution of the monasteries, right?

veer, I too heard that Edward was a sickly boy from birth. What did he actually die from?

Ach! Lydia, I was being cynical again. For a while it seemed to me that every 'major motion picture' costume drama, or made-for-television drama, or historical novel was set in the sixteenth century -- nearly always in England, as if nothing was going on during that time anywhere else. Also, I have run into more than my share of scholars who know every little detail about the Tudors but blasted little about anything else. I do think it was a fascinating era and the Tudors are interesting, but I have a suspicion that the sixteenth century and the Tudors are such attractive subjects for filmmakers and novelists (and historians) because they are easy -- there is so much documentation and previous research to fall back on. Other historical eras are neglected because they aren't so easy. I think that's one of the reasons I am fascinated with Mantel's approach to otherwise previously well-covered (threadbare?) material.

Did she go too far? I see what you mean, Lydia: Cromwell's progress (from the gutter, if indeed he rose from the gutter) does seem a bit unbelievable -- not impossible but far-fetched, as Vee has mentioned. I have an easier time thinking that More wasn't so motivated by love of his God and Church. That could be my own cynicism again, though, which perhaps reflects a lot of the cynicism of our particular times.

Vee, I'm with Lydia: I'm curious about Edward's demise. Why did it get started and to whose advantage was the propagation of the story that he was sickly? What have you heard of the various theories of what ailed Princess/Queen Mary? Mantel alluded to Mary's problems in one passage (she whispered to her mother, the queen, something about it being "her time of the month" or however she stated it). I've heard everything from ovarian tumors to endometriosis.

Regarding Edward,I shall quote from a book that I own .

"The consumptive, delirious youth died at Greenwich on 6th July 1553 in his sixteenth year".

Lydia & Frieda, I've tried 'looking up' the death of Edward. One source ranges from TB, arsenic poisoning or syphilis to an article in the New England Journal of Medicine which suggests a rapidly progressive TB developed after measles. So take your pick. Maybe we have always considered him to be delicate because the portraits of him show a thin pale little boy, with none of the robust red-haired choleric 'look' of H VIII. But E's Mother, Jane Seymour was pale and mousy looking.
As far I know (Queen) Mary did suffer 'female problems' certainly at the end of her life and not in the first flush of youth, when she convinced herself she was pregnant, despite having spent almost no time with husband Philip II (they were even married by proxy). She apparently 'swelled up' and continued to suffer for over a year before dying.
What I find interesting is that both Mary and the much younger Elizabeth seemed fond of their little brother and used to sew him small garments, and both girls were immensely proud of being the daughters of Henry, despite the less than fatherly treatment he had shown them until just before his death when he 'reinstated' them in line to the throne.

June and Vee, well, consumption was an oft-used diagnosis -- physicians were great lumpers in the sixteenth century, having no way really to tell one disease from another. Consumption was as common in England, it seems, as the common cold is today. However, true consumption (tuberculosis) is generally a wasting disease, so Edward might have been showing relatively mild signs of consumption for years before the measles exacerbated his condition and sped up his decline and death.

It's interesting that there seems to have been contemporaneous suggestions that all wasn't well with Edward, even before the illness that killed him. Right now I can't lay my hands on sources to cite, but it's a perception I've long held from my reading. (Apparently held by many?) If he really was healthy, why was it circulated that he wasn't?

Ahh! Vee, as you may recall, biomedical diagnoses of historical figures is one of my pet interests. Looking at the portrait of infant Edward by Holbein the Younger (link below) shows a cherubic face -- fair in complexion, to be sure, but not pale. Of course Holbein could have fudged and made Edward healthier looking than he really was. (As he apparently fudged on the portrait of Anne of Cleves to make her more attractive. Interesting that he didn't give Jane Seymour the same consideration. Nor did he flatter T. Cromwell. I wonder about Henry VIII.)

Mantel's descriptions of the various characters' physical features seem to hold to the prevailing views: after she aged, Queen Katherine was as wide as she was tall; Princess Mary was a "thumbnail" (dwarfish); Anne Boleyn had an unusually long, slender neck; Lady Carey (Mary Boleyn) was irresistibly pretty, in a pink & white sort of way; Jane Seymour was pasty-faced; and Anne of Cleves was ugly as a mud fence. She also hints at the possibility of Anne Boleyn having had a hand deformity (AB apparently had the habit of withdrawing her hands into her sleeves). So much of this we've absorbed as fact but how much of it was true and how much was subjective opinion --'beauty is in the eye of the beholder' and 'different ages have different standards of beauty', etc.?

Here is a link that might be useful: {{gwi:2117444}}

A pale portrait of Edward VI below.
Certainly Holbein paints a pleasing portrait of a bonny baby who looks remarkable like his father. You will have noticed that the plainer the 'sitter' the more the artist made much of their dress/costume plus all those allegorical bits and pieces that were strewn around the canvas.
For some interesting ideas about the Tudors, you can type 'David Starkey' into Google and watch excerpts from his TV series on youtube, or read various articles about and by him. He is the Big Name in all things Tudor at the moment and doesn't come over as rude as he appears in one-to-one interviews.

Here is a link that might be useful: {{gwi:2117445}}

Friedag, I too have got tired of the way the "entertainment industry" goes through stretches of copying each other. I remember about ten or fifteen years ago there was a craze for remaking every movie from a Jane Austen novel. Then when Austen was exhausted they began turning out anything that remotely resembled Austen. With diminishing quality, I think. I must have missed most of the "Tudorizing" you refer to, unless "The Other Boleyn Girl" is part of it. What a travesty both the book and movie are. Yes - somehow I was talked into reading and seeing them.

I have often wondered why certain periods of history are so popular to study, read about and dramatize. Is the 16th century considered the most important and interesting century in English history? Not necessarily to the English - I am thinking more about the perceptions of non-English people. Americans might not know squat about any other century in English history, but most (I hope) have heard of Henry the Eighth who had all those wives, the Virgin Queen and Shakespeare. I read somewhere that the history that is most repeated is the most important, whether it should be or not.

The "Pale Edward" does look rather puny to me. I can understand how that portrait could give a false impression of his state of health.

Friedag, I like how Mantel worked in the physical descriptions of the characters. I think it was probably important that she make them recognizable to readers who already know something about at least the most famous ones. I think you are anticipating the Anne of Cleves description from Mantel. :)

Freiday: As I recall, Anne Bolyn was reputed to have an extra digit on her hands.

If I may I quote from my little book on Kings and Queens of England - Edited by Antonia Fraser (it is a gem).
Regarding Edward
"By mid 1552 there was no doubt about the King's frailty and even courtiers regarded him as a living corpse".

frieday..Great portrait, a really bonney boy.

Mantel seems to be a master of character descriptions, she has really done her research. Anne of Cleves "ugly as a mud fence".

veer, a great portrait of A Pale Edward.

June, thank you for the citation! I knew I had to have received the impression from somewhere; and with the likes of Antonia Fraser disseminating it, it's no wonder that it is believed widely. But it still begs the question: what do the primary sources say? I gather they must be contradictory or vague for there now to be a dispute over Edward's actual health before whatever it was that killed him.

Leel, I've heard that about Anne's extra digits -- wasn't that supposed to have been one of the "proofs" of Anne being a sorceress? Mantel uses a lot of imagery of Anne's "tiny hands"; e.g., her fiddling with and picking at things, and especially when she was stroking Henry at the conference she attended, in full view of his mesmerized but very uncomfortable advisers. I rather expected that Mantel would say something outright about an extra finger or two, but she was coy. Perhaps the reports of polydactyly were calumny. Mantel also worked in a reference or two to "the hump-backed one." I'd always heard that Shakespeare is responsible for that smirch on Richard III, but maybe it predated and he only popularized it.

Ha! Good one, Lydia. You caught me going outside the book -- Wolf Hall that is. Mantel had better hurry writing the sequel, because I'm as eager as the one American in Martin's story at Oberammergau: I want to find out what happens. ;-)

Who needs to lead a discussion?

I'm just sitting back and enjoying it...!

But having said that - what did you think of the relationship between Thomas and Cardinal Wolsey? We haven't really discussed "the cardinal" yet (apart from a short quote earlier). Speaking from relative ignorance, I felt that Wolsey was a much more sympathetic character than the way he's normally portrayed. I felt almost as if Thomas felt he had to replace Wolsey in the King's affections out of loyalty to Wolsey. How did you feel?

But yes - I'm with you, Freida - I want to know what happens next too.

I finally stopped reading other books and finished Wolf Hall. It was definitely worth reading but I didn't love it because the writing style kept pulling me out of the story and that is annoying. Both Cromwell and Wolsey are sympathetic characters -- Cromwell especially so because he appeared to go out of his way to give More a chance to save his life. However, he did seem to feel resentful that More did not remember him.

Anne Boleyn certainly was a manipulative person, wasn't she?

My question for those who know so much more that me: Did Cromwell ever have a relationship with Jane Seymour?

In addition to Wolf Hall being the name of the home of the Seymours, the court itself could be called a hall of wolves. Maybe that is the meaning of the book's title.

I'm not so sure I want to read the sequel because now that I've come to care about Cromwell I wouldn't want to read the end of that book.

"In addition to Wolf Hall being the name of the home of the Seymours, the court itself could be called a hall of wolves."

I like that suggestion!

Re Anne and the extra digits and long sleeves - I have read that she brought the fashion of very long sleeves with her from France in order to make it easier to hide the one extra finger she had.
I also have the book edited by Antonia Fraser, and refer to it all the time *g*

Frances, do you suppose all the hand imagery was symbolic of Anne's manipulativeness? (Manipulate: from the Latin manipulus, to handle) I'm lousy at figuring out symbolism and I'm awed that some writers apparently work out symbolism in the same way they outline plots. I guess that's why I was never good at writing fiction: I never could think of these things intentionally, beforehand!

Heh! Yes, I'm with Martin: that's a great suggestion: "a hall of wolves." Cromwell thought of the saying, "homo homini lupus, man is wolf to man." When I read that, a few bells went off in my head, but I didn't make the connection like you did, Frances. Very clever of you! Now if that's what Mantel meant or her publishers intended, I don't know -- but if they didn't, they ought to have!

I've never heard or read anywhere (I don't think) of Cromwell having had an amorous relationship with Jane Seymour. But Mantel may be hinting that she will put them together in one. See, it's things like this that make me anticipate the next installment: how is Mantel going to handle this? And, oh god, Cromwell's ending...mercy, mercy. Frances, I have gotten thoroughly attached to Mantel's characterization of Cromwell, too. She's made him so real and human.

Martin, yes, I felt that Cromwell genuinely must have loved Wolsey. It was interesting that Wolsey was always "appearing" to Cromwell -- sometimes in a corner or just out of candle range -- when Cromwell needed to work something out.

Lydia, you've got me mulling over the why-the-sixteenth-century question. I've got some amorphous ideas. When they coalesce a bit, I'll get back with you.

You guys are great at making me think!

I think the story of A B's 'extra digit' goes right back to whenever, though unlikely to have been a fully formed finger don't you think?
I feel the idea of Cromwell having set his cap at Jane Seymour is pure Mantel as is the origin of the dislike/mistrust of Cromwell towards More. Certainly as a young man More was a page in the household of Archbishop Moreton but as we don't really know anything about Cromwell's background/upbringing their meeting as youths must be pure imagination.
Cardinal Wolsey has always been portrayed as a fat, greedy, manipulative man and I suppose he was all of those things but, certainly Mantel does paint a sympathetic picture of him and it seems to have done Cromwell no harm that he stuck by Wolsey to the end and didn't 'jump the sinking ship'.
It seems strange to me (and maybe it is just a 'modern' way of thinking) but all the main players in these games with the monarchs of their day must have realised what would befall them if they trod on a Royal toe, upset the Princely apple-cart, backed the wrong Imperial filly, yet, rather than live a quiet life they put everything they held dear . . . wealth, family, position etc on the line. Couldn't they see that it would all lead to tears before bed-time? Well tears for those who still had a head left on their shoulders.

But, Vee, if the finger(s) had been fully formed and fully functional, it would have been harder for casual observers to realize that there was more than is normal -- especially if Anne never kept her hands still or habitually contracted them into her sleeves. I had a botany professor that continually "talked" with her hands as she lectured us. My seat was right in front of her and one day as I watched her, it dawned on me that there was something odd about her left hand. I completely forgot to listen to her because I was too busy trying to count her fingers -- it was impossible. When I mentioned it to a classmate, she reacted with "No! I never noticed that. Are you sure?" I wasn't sure, so during the next lecture, my classmate and I both watched obsessively. Ms. B noticed me concentrating on her hands and to my great embarrassment, she walked over to my desk and placed her hand, with spread fingers, on my desk so I could count 'em. Sure enough, there was a thumb and five perfectly formed and fully functional fingers -- but I couldn't tell if there was an extra pinky or some other. Ms. B smiled at me and walked away without comment.

Frieda, there is no way I can better that. I know a couple of people with too few digits but they were the victims of the thalidomide scandal.

I have read of AB's extra digit "Her enemies remarked on the rudimentary sixth finger on her left hand - a sure sign, they said, of a sorceress."

Also another description was that it was most probably just a lump at the side of the finger with a double finger nail.

She is also said to have had quite a few big moles (witchery again)all over her body especially one on her chest in a 'nipple' shape, hence the rumor that she had three breasts.

Wow a much talked about lady!!!

Indeed, June, Anne Boleyn seems to have always been fascinating. Who was it that ascertained the 'nipple' mole? Was it her ladies in waiting? Or was it after her death that her body was scrutinized?

All this talk of AB relates to Lydia's question about why the sixteenth century of the Tudors is such a popular period for scholars, writers, readers, and dramatists. Lydia, let me run this by you:

Well, the drama part is owed to Shakespeare, primarily. Though he came toward the end of the century, he covered the earlier years most effectively (perhaps not accurately but nonetheless effectively). But the study, writing, and reading of that century's history maintain interest for the widest collection of people because it was a century of women -- that is, some of the most interesting historical figures of that time were women. Of course there was Elizabeth I and her sister Bloody Mary, but also Henry's wives and Mary, Queen of Scots. True, previous centuries had their fascinating women -- Mathilda, Eleanor of Aquitaine, Katherine Swynford, etc. -- but mostly they were ancillary to the real historymakers, the men.

Can anyone imagine the sixteenth century without its female 'power players'? Kids (girls, anyway) will look glassy-eyed when revolts are discussed, yawn through what kings fought which wars, and snore when what Parliament did is examined. But watch 'em wake up when Henry's women-troubles are mentioned and get animated when they realize how Henry treated his daughters, especially since it turned out that the daughters were more historically influential than his precious son.

Come to think of it: that other century that is so darling nowadays to scholars, writers, readers, dramatists, and drama-watchers had its Queen and interesting female movers and shakers. :-)

What do you think?

LOL! Friedag, I suspect you have pegged a huge part of the reasons the 16th and 19th centuries get more attention than most of the others. In your theory I certainly recognize why those centuries interest me and, yes, it is the females that make things more intriguing.

>"Kids (girls, anyway) will look glassy-eyed when revolts are discussed, yawn through what kings fought which wars, and snore when what Parliament did is examined. But watch 'em wake up when Henry's women-troubles are mentioned.."

Not only kids but adults too, male and female!

>"rather than live a quiet life they put everything they held dear . . . wealth, family, position etc on the line."

Veer, was it just gambling that was inherent in their motivations? Cromwell was a gambler, wasn't he?

Lydia, an excellent analogy. And what stakes could be higher than losing your job, your head or your property and quite possibly your family? Maybe it was the combination of serving your monarch plus the huge riches and benefits that would follow and maybe especially for Cromwell the idea that these riches would make him equal to the great lords of the land.

Frieda an interesting thing about the part women played at this time. Another one you could have mentioned is Lady Jane Grey, the 'nine days Queen'. Of course she and the wives of Henry VIII were only pawns in a man's world but it is by the time of Elizabeth, we get the greatest Queen we have had.
Queens are not given to costly wars/killing/strutting their stuff as Kings are, so the country was pretty much at peace, with this came the growth of trade, the voyages of discovery and the relative rise of a prosperous population. I think this led to the blossoming of drama, music, architecture etc.
After the disastrous reign of Mary who surrounded herself with plotting priests and Spaniards and the fires of the burning 'heretics', it is no wonder that the country could settle down to what was, for those days, a remarkable degree of toleration which lasted the best part of twenty years.

Lydia, I recognize myself, too; in fact, that's why your question interests me so much. It's been floating around in my mind for some time -- even before this thread -- as to who drives the popularity machine for the sixteenth century. Sure, there are male academics/historians (David Starkey for one, as Vee says) who specialize in the Tudors and the sixteenth century, but I've found it's mainly women who are junkies for anything (books, films, majoring in sixteenth-century English Lit, etc.) concerning the 'Tudor century'. And it starts young (unlike the interest in most history) with females, but why? Then in a eureka-moment I knew -- at least, I think I know! -- of course, it's all those women's stories. Their history can be spun out into all kinds of imaginative scenarios: witness, as you mentioned, Lydia, the success of something as mediocre (or worse) as The Other Boleyn Girl.

I wonder how old Mantel was when the Tudor-bug bit her. But Mantel's fiction is of an entirely higher-calibre, and though she certainly works the women in to great effect, it's interesting that she chose to highlight Cromwell. I think she did a superb job drawing out her version of the character of a man not generally considered for the starring role -- though he probably always should have been...he played one of the leading parts, surely?

I've got questions about Cranmer: I don't know the chronology of when he was infected with the "German heresy," but would he have been as sympathetic to Henry's plight if he hadn't had a "surprise" of his own? That surprise must've thrown Cromwell for a loop -- indeed, perhaps in much the same way as Mantel writes. And why would Cranmer have wished for a daughter (which he was granted)? Well, maybe he just wanted a daughter, some fathers do, but it seemed an odd juxtaposition to Henry's situation and I don't know how to interpret it.

Okay, there's the old saw about Henry VIII getting syphilis because "Cardinal Wolsey whispered in his ear." I don't figure the Cardinal of York was chaste, but he seems to have had too agile a mind to have been suffering from tertiary syphilis when he died. What question am I leading up to? I can't remember! :-)

>"maybe especially for Cromwell the idea that these riches would make him equal to the great lords of the land."

Veer, was that not an unusual idea for a "common man" to think he could be equal? Everyone was so obsessed with bloodlines and how far back and to whom they could be traced.

Friedag, what you say sounds very plausible. I think the rise of "women's studies" has also contributed to the clustering effect in certain time periods for women writers and readers. Young readers especially will flock to whatever is perceived as the "hottest." They love being part of the crowd. :)

My goodness, Friedag, what a set-up! I hope you remember your question. You have reminded me that I wondered about Wolsey's death. The messenger told Cromwell that the cardinal had fasted for a week and might have meant to destroy himself. However he did eat some spiced pears and got really bad indigestion. It seemed that he could have been poisoned. I thought it was odd too that the messenger avoided Cromwell's question about whether the cardinal said anything about him (Cromwell) again.

I do not know how to interpret Cranmer's wanting a daughter, either. I wonder if that is something that Mantel thought up or whether it could have been in some of Cranmer's personal writing and Mantel saw a context in her story to use it.

Lydia, as you suggest, the idea of everyone 'knowing their place' was ingrained in English society since the year dot. Even in these so-called egalitarian times when an opinion poll found that x% of the population considered themselves to be Middle Class eyebrows were raised and fingers were wagged "Who do these people think they are?" At the other extreme it used to be popular from the '60's onwards to go the other way and search for ancestors who were poor and working class and as an eg. many 'left wing' but successful people sent their children to inner-city 'sink' schools (for which the kids have never forgiven them).
All this is really saying that Cromwell, and men like him, who were making their way up through the Law, rather than via the Church, the New Men of Tudor England were treated with slight respect and equally feared by everyone but never quite 'accepted'. These were the men who bought up the land that became available after the Dissolution of the Monasteries and tried to buy themselves 'titles' . . .in some ways things are still similar today . . .especially if you want a title and have friends in high Parliamentary places. :-)

Frieda, I read WH during what passed for our summer and cannot remember the finer points. Could you rephrase your comments/questions about Cranmer please; I'm out on a limb here!

Ach, Lydia and Vee. Sorry! I accidentally inflicted you with the stream-of-consciousness first draft of my post.

Lydia, after an interruption I had a brain cramp, so in the revised version (that you didn't get) I deleted the part about Wolsey. I'm amazed that you got as much out of it as you did, because I think I was going somewhere in the same direction as you with the possible-poisoning scenario. I'm just as puzzled as you about the bearer-of-bad-news' sidestepping of Cromwell's wanting to know if the cardinal had said anything about him. All I can gather is the whole situation is supposed to be enigmatic -- to Cromwell as much as to us readers.

Vee, Cromwell received a letter from Cranmer while the latter was in Germany. In the margin Cranmer wrote that he would be returning to London with a "surprise." The surprise was a German wife and the wife was pregnant. Cranmer, at the time, was supposedly still a Catholic priest, so this blindsided Cromwell, but only briefly. Cromwell wasn't so worried about Cranmer fathering a child as he was about the marriage, but he (Cromwell) would figure something out. Cranmer told Cromwell he wanted a daughter, though it's not clear why Cranmer volunteered his hope.

Later after Henry was given the news that his and Anne's new child was a girl, Cranmer reflected that he had hoped for a daughter, and got one, while the king prayed for but wasn't granted a son. Lydia points out that this could just have been Mantel's imaginative bit and never actually happened. Nevertheless, it seems to indicate something, though I'm not sure what. Could a daughter for Cranmer not have been as dangerous as a son?

Frieda, thanks for clarifying the bit about Cranmer. I don't know whether the son/daughter thing is 'true' or a Mantel fiction. Certainly Cranmer had been married as a young man, but probably at the time he was only in 'Minor Orders' making it little more than a slap-on-the-wrist-offence. That wife died in childbirth.
Quite a few interesting interviews with Mantel on 'youtube' which shed some light on these discussions.

Here is a link that might be useful: Hilary Mantel

Just bringing this up again, to see if anyone else has anything to add....

I don't have anything to add to this very interesting discussion, but I have just finished the book. I really enjoyed it and want to do some more reading on the main characters. My knowledge of More was pretty much gleaned from A Man for All Seasons, I'm afraid.

bringing this back up as I am nearly finished reading it; I came late to the game; I knew I'd find a good discussion here; I've got a lot to think about as I tackle the last 100 pages or so.

I'm a new member to this discussion group, having been googling WH. I've found the discussion really interesting, having read the book twice, loving it, and now skipping through it again in preparation for a book group discussion. What really intrigues me is the line between historical fact & fiction. Have any of you come accross any info. on what primary sources Mantel used in her research for the book?

I wanted very much to like this book. I should have liked it, but I could not force myself to go on past fifty or so pages. Most unfortunately for me, it is written in the present tense. I find this technique for novels simply unendurable, and I gave up on it.

Rosefolly

preb, I don't know what, if any, primary sources ie original letters/manuscripts etc Mantel used for the book. I don't own a copy so cannot check if there is a bibliography at the back. There are certainly very many learned works about that period she must have studied.
Paula/rosefolly the present tense didn't bother me once I got used to it, although it must be far more difficult to write this way.
It's been interesting to re-read this thread.

I just read this interesting piece by Hilary Mantel on winning the Booker prize.

Here is a link that might be useful: Eyes on the Prize

Excellent article, thank you vee.

I'm with rosefolly. I wanted very much to like this but just could not get into it, so it went unfinished back to the library. ( A real shame, because I am fascinated by this particular time period in English history).