Given the continuing pandemic lock down restrictions, reading fictional novels as well as non-fiction, is an ideal way of spending lock down time productively.
Wolf Hall combines non- fiction with Hilary Mantel writing about King Henry VIII, Thomas More, Thomas Cromwell and many others, with her fiction, writing about their lives, loves and children (legitimate and illegitimate). She has deep insight into the human condition at the time and dare I say it, now. She writes though not from the point of view of Thomas More but more from the viewpoints of the women; Catherine of Aragon, Anne Boleyn and servants.
Perhaps as a Catholic, much of my knowledge of the time concerns the martyrdom of St Thomas More. He was beheaded on 6th July 1535 for refusing to accept King Henry VIII as head of the Church but only canonised as a saint by the pope on the 19th May 1935, which I have always thought reflects the attitude of the Catholic Church and society at large, to lawyers.
Possibly reading simply becomes more difficult with age as I found it difficult to read more than a dozen or so pages of the 653 page hardback version at a single sitting. None the less it was very satisfying to complete the whole tome earlier this week.
I had thought Hilary Mantel to be a male author but learned only recently she is a woman -Hilary is one of those Christian names (Hilary was/is a Catholic) that can apply to both men and women. The language she uses in the book is remarkably deep. Thus taking a passage at random, she writes (page 241):
"...It is a dark morning and your eyes naturally turn towards Anne, but something shadowy is bobbing about, on the fringes of the circle of light. Anne says, 'Dr Cranmer is just back from Rome. He brings no good news, of course.'
They know each other; Cranmer has worked from time to time for the cardinal, as indeed who has not? Now he is active in the king's case. They embrace cautiously: Cambridge scholar, person from Putney..."
Wolf Hall is one of a trilogy, the second of which like the first also won the Booker prize, making I believe the author the first 'British' well she is probably Irish, author to win the prize twice.
After such a fulfilling tome the supposedly final Scottish fictional novel about D.I. John Rebus was an excellent but lighter read.
HM, brought up Catholic, has no time for the Church.
ReplyDeleteFrom her Wikipedia page:- "In an interview with the Telegraph, Mantel stated: "I think that nowadays the Catholic Church is not an institution for respectable people." She continued in the interview to say: "When I was a child I wondered why priests and nuns were not nicer people. I thought that they were amongst the worst people I knew." These statements, as well as the themes explored in her earlier novel Fludd, have led some to question her work in Wolf Hall, with Bishop Mark O'Toole noting: "There is an anti-Catholic thread there, there is no doubt about it. Wolf Hall is not neutral."
See also the review in 'America' - https://www.americamagazine.org/arts-culture/2020/07/17/hilary-mantels-case-against-st-thomas-more
Greetings anon. You may be correct but reading the novel the difference between the way in which I learned about life and religion under Henry VIII and Hilary Mantel’s novel about that time, was clear. That does not detract from the quality of her writing though.
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