The novel, "The Autobiography of Henry VIII With Notes by His Fool, Will Somers", in short was superb. Throughout this novel, I felt as if I was living Henry VIII's life. My opinion of Henry VIII has not changed but I certainly have gained more knowledge by reading this novel.
The author, Margaret George, wrote a fascinating novel and I recommend this as a must read for any Tudor Follower. A lot of us know the background of Henry VIII, but this novel provides behind the scene narratives about this controversial King.
I have the "Mary Queen of Scotland and The Isles novel", as well as "Elizabeth I", both written by Margaret George and I look forward to reading them both.
Below are passages that I found most interesting while reading, "The Autobiography of Henry VIII With Notes by His Fool, Will Somers" by Margaret George:
P.224.
Why did I take the Pope's side? There are those who say that I meant to merely to curry favour with the Pope, later to throw off my cloak to reveal my true colors - which is to say, no colour at all. To those critics, I have no religious convictions at all; I use religion to further my own ends. An equally insulting interpretation is that I am so inconsistent that I go first to one side and then to the other on the whim of a mood.
The truth (to disappoint my critics and evil wishers) is neither of these. I found Luther's beliefs to heretical and dangerous. Taken as a whole, they led to anarchy. They also rebelled against Christ himself, Who plainly set up the Church.
I believed the Church should be purified, not dismantled. And that is what I have with the Church of England. It is simple! Why do people make the simple so complicated?
P. 271
I removed Anne from court within a fortnight, sending her back to Hever. It was easily done: the mere writing out of an order, signed, sanded, sealed. As King, I had power to move people about as I would, transfer them from one post to another. But I seemingly had no power over my wife, my daughter, my fantasized mistress. Women! They rule us, subtly if you will, but rule us nonetheless.
P.301
Katherine drew herself up. "Doctors! They are stupid creatures. You yourself know the truth." Yes, I did. God had pointed out the truth. "The Pope will decide", she said smugly. "He will know God's will".
God's will. What did Clement know of God's will? Theologians knew better than he. "The learned theologians in every university will study the case and decide it. And if the Pope does not, thereafter, rule in my favor, I shall declare the Pope a heretic and cease to obey him."
P.416-417 (Henry praying to God)
"God, I beg You, fill me with the wisdom to server You better. Let me know Your will in all my doings, so that I may obey. Show me when I astray so that I may correct myself straightway." Do not let me become an abomination in Your sight, like the prior.
The wind rose. I felt the cold all about me, and it caused my leg to ache. "O Lord God, take this infirmity away from me!" My words turned to puffs of smoke on the frigid air. "Please, I beg You, I beseech You...I can bear it no longer! I know it is a mark of Your disfavour" - the words were tumbling out now, without modesty or seemliness- "but wherein have I failed? Show me clear, bid me do a thing, and I will do it! But tease me no more with bodily infirmities!"
I was angry with God - yes, furious with His way of punishing me for an unknown sin. Was this fair? No earthly ruler would behave in so devious a fashion.
P. 551 (After Anne Boleyn was executed and the King's involvement with Jane Seymour)
Happy at last. Why is it so difficult to describe happiness? There are words aplenty for anguish, despair, suffering, and these are full of vitality. But happiness is left with weak verbs, supine adjectives, drooping adverbs. A description of happiness moves a reader to skip over those passages and causes a writer to flounder in treacle...
But human happiness...all our words for it are so bland, as if the thing itself were bland, or merely an absence of pain. When in fact happiness is solid, muscular, and strong; its colour all the spectrum of light; its sound as sweet as water splashing in a Pharaoh's desert palace; and its smells those of the flesh and its life: fur, hear, cooking.
I was happy with Jane, as happy as one of the great cats stretched out in the sun around Wolf Hall. Only touch them and feel their deep, rumbling purrs, as they rest entirely in the present moment. That was me, that summer Jane & I were one.
P. 669
"Master Gardener" I called. Slowly he stood upright. He was ancient. His face was so wizened and wrinkled it was difficult to see the eyes, and a great hat shaded his entire face. But his hearing was evidently in order. "Eh?'
"Is this garden your special charge?" Aye. For twenty years." He gestured toward the wall of climbers. "I started these when they were but small shoots. One came from Jerusalem. The red one. We call is 'Saviour's Blood.' "
"Tell me", I asked, "the colours of roses. Are they but red & white?" He hitched up his pantaloons and strode out of the plants. "In the wild, yes. But in gardens one can cross them, modify the colors somewhat. But we cannot get two colours on one flower, no, alas." He was thinking I had come to chide him about producing a perfect "Tudor rose" like the ones in carvings, which had red petals on the outside, while inside....
P. 698 (Speaking to Catherine Howard, Henry's Fifth Wife)
..."to hunt...on the shortest day of the year...in the twilight..." She sounded genuinely distressed. "What happens in the twilight?" Perhaps she knew something I did not. "If you should go near a churchyard, as it's growing dark...Saint Thomas himself will come, driving in a fiery chariot. And then he calls on all dead men named Thomas who are buried there, and they rise from their graves, and go with him to the churchyard cross, which glows deeply and strangely red..." As she spoke, her face took on an otherworldly look, and it was as if I held a seer, a prophetess. "And sometimes one is compelled to go with the saint, forever, on a ghostly hunt. Or with the other Thomases....Think, O my dear Lord, on the Thomases in your life...the dead Thomases....They take possession - "
I felt fear go through me, as sharp and cold as a rapier that had lain out all through January night. The dead Thomases in my life: Thomas Wolsey, Thomas More, Thomas Cromwell. What if they should rise from their graves and confront me, take possession of my person, hold a trial of me in some distant secluded churchyard? Wolsey's ghost, all shrunken and broken; More, without his head, festering in reproach and self-self-righteouness; Cromwell, his neck-stump still bleeding, bitter and filled with vicious hatred...."
P. 776 (After Catherine Howard was executed)
As I had grown older, my needs grew fewer and fewer. At one time it had been important to me that I have a powerful body and a pretty wife. Both these things were now taken away, and their possibilities were gone. I had wanted riches and beautiful palace furnishings, but now I had them and they delighted me not...All I wanted now was the respect and love of my subjects, and a modicum of health. Dwindling needs, but fiercely coveted nonetheless.
P. 803
Mary. For so many years, an enchanting child. Then a pawn in the war between Katherine and myself. Then - a nothing. I had not thought of her needs, I had been so assiduous in meeting my own. I had thought she would keep, keep until I was at peace.
P. 829 (Henry VIII to a young Elizabeth)
Yet my heart ached to see her go. Who can explain the human heart? Mary was my firstborn, my only child for so long, and nothing could ever alter that. Edward was the gift I had prayed for, so long withheld. Elizabeth? She was a disappointment from the first, she was naught, she was the wrong sex, from the wrong woman, and in the wrong order of birth. Nevertheless she was the most intriguing to me, and I could not fathom why. Perhaps because she was the only one of the children not afraid of me. As indeed why should she be? She alone, perhaps, of all persons in the realm, was untouchable by my wrath. I could never execute her; I had already illegitimized her, but I would never disclaim her; in short, I had already done to her the worst of what I could so, and she knew that. And I knew that.
P. 904 (Following Charles Brandon''s, the Duke of Suffolk's, funeral)
Now I was alone. The one person who had truly loved me, and known me throughout all my life, was gone. Brandon had loved me when I was yet the second son; had taken my side when Arthur still held favour and sway.
I put my hand up along the great coffin. "I love you," I said, as I had never said to any woman.
