A KNIGHT TO REMEMBER...actor SIR GODFREY SEYMOUR TEARLE

By Richard Tearle

Sir Godfrey Seymour Tearle was a British actor who portrayed the quintessential British gentleman on stage and in both British and US films... 

Godfrey Tearle as MacBeth
with Diana Wynyard.

Photo: Angus McBean used with kind permission 

of the Royal Shakespeare Company

The 'spiritual home' of the entire Tearle family lies in a little village in Bedfordshire called Stanbridge.  Anyone bearing that name even today has roots there and so we are all related in one way or another. So Godfrey Tearle was my relative though I cannot determine exactly how distant a relationship it would be.

No grand titles or  high born family connections for we Tearles: Agricultural Labourers for the most part, right up to the 20^th Century. Some of them helped build the London and North Western Railway from Leighton Buzzard to London.

Some were soldiers, like Godfrey Tearle's grandfather, George, who served in the Crimea War. He was a Stanbridge man. His son, also George, was born in Plymouth, however, and was immediately taken by a life on the stage. He changed his name to Osmond Tearle, found success in America as well as the UK and was famous enough to turn down acting with Beerbohm Tree – the finest of his generation. That would have repercussions later, but is another story.

Osmond married Marianne Conway, herself from an acting family and it was a second marriage for both of them. Marianne already had a young son from her first marriage to jazz player Jules Levy. When their first son, Godfrey, was born in 1884, Frederick Levy was his half-brother. Frederick would later change his name to Conway Tearle and was a suave silent movie matinee idol.

The family returned to England, settling in Penrith, near Carlisle  where the boys went to school. Godfrey got a call to stand in for a sick child playing Prince Richard (the one murdered in the Tower) in the Shakespeare play, Richard III. He was nine years old. Osmond was what was known as an actor-manager, in that he not only performed but had his own company, travelling around and putting on plays. Godfrey joined his father's company and took over when Osmond died in 1901. In 1908, Godfrey co-starred with his then wife, Mary Malone, in Romeo and Juliet at the Lyceum Theatre in London. The performance was filmed, the first such example in England.

“Like this?”

Godfrey, having given up the company, worked with Beerbohm Tree but the latter made life uncomfortable and it was not a happy experience for him.

Postcard of The Garden of Allah – with camels!

In 1915, Godfrey joined up with the Royal Horse Artillery, seeing action at Paschendeale and may have been wounded. But he came out of the war and resumed his acting career, triumphing in The Garden of Allah on stage playing the tortured priest who has to choose between God and the woman he loves. The play was a huge success despite the fact that on the opening night, the audience were showered with pease which were being used to simulate a sandstorm. Unfortunately, someone forgot to lower the specially constructed mesh curtain – the audience took it in good part, however. The play also featured live camels on stage.

As Othello

Photo: Angus McBean used with kind permission 

of the Royal Shakespeare Company

Godfrey's forte was Shakespeare and he took the lead on three occasions at Stratford, starring in MacBeth, Othello and Anthony and Cleopatra. This latter he took on tour to America but without his Stratford leading lady, [Dame] Edith Evans. Katherine Cornell took that part in the states and one young actor in the cast would find fame as Charlton Heston. So impressed was Godfrey that he wanted to bring Heston to Stratford but Equity vetoed it. Godfrey confided that “Cleopatra has to be a bit of a slut and whatever you say about Edith, a slut she is not...”

As Anthony with (Dame) Edith Evans as Cleopatra

Photo: Angus McBean used with kind permission 

of the Royal Shakespeare Company

Godfrey also made many films, though sadly, he is rather overlooked in this too. He was cast  as the evil Professor Jordan in Hitchcock's original classic, The 39 Steps. He played the rear gunner in the cult film One Of Our Aircraft Is Missing and was cast as President Roosevelt in The Beginning of the End, a film about the creation of the atom bomb used on Hiroshima. He also made a cameo appearance as the steam loving Bishop Ollie in the wonderful Ealing comedy The Titfield Thunderbolt. This was his last film as he passed away following a long illness in 1952.

Movie poster  and...

... The Titfield Thunderbolt

He was married three times – to actresses Mary Malone and Stella Freeman and, following Stella's early death, to Huntley and Palmer's heiress, Barbara Palmer. That marriage, as with Mary, ended in divorce and he spent his final years in the company of the young actress Jill Bennett, whom he met when she was cast in his production of MacBeth at Stratford. He had no children and confided to Jill that he did not wish any children of his to suffer the same life as he had led, continuously uprooting their lives to travel around the country or even further afield. It was another relative of mine who contacted Jill Bennett and persuaded her to write the book 'Godfrey: A Special Time Remembered' which, although inaccurate in some areas, is a wonderful tribute to the man.

Cover of Jill Bennett's book
of memories of Godfrey

All in all, he was a wonderful actor, the possessor of a rich, mellifluous voice and highly respected by his contemporaries – he was actually nicknamed 'God' by his Stratford colleagues – and he was universally approved to become the first president of the then newly formed actor's union, Equity, though he said that he would stand down once they were admitted to the Trade Union's Council. A man of his word, this he did. It was for this service that he received his knighthood.

Many years ago I had the honour and pleasure to speak on the telephone to Sir Donald Sinden, well known for his stories involving actors, and he told me this lovely tale:

Godfrey and some of his friends were in their club and one of them was so drunk that he could not possibly be trusted to find his way home. Godfrey, being sober, offered to drive the chap home, but Godfrey could not make out what the man was saying when he asked him his address.  Finally he thought he had it and drove to a place in south London but could not find the road. “Lords” declared his friend, “I can get home from Lords!” So Godfrey turned the car around and drove all the way back and then on to Lords Cricket ground (in north London). Once there he turned to his friend and asked, “How do you get to your home from Lords?”

Came the reply: “By Tube ….”

Godfrey Seymour Tearle : 12 October 1884 - 9 June 1953 (aged 68)

© Richard Tearle

Richard is a Discovering Diamonds reviewer (and my good friend) 

Partial filmography

The Fool (1913) - Sterndale

The March Hare (1919) - Guy

A Sinless Sinner (1919) - Tom Harvey

Fancy Dress (1919) - Tony Broke

Nobody's Child (1919) - Ernest d'Alvard

Queen's Evidence (1919) - Adam Pascal

Salome of the Tenements (1925) - John Manning

Guy of Warwick (1926, Short) - Guy of Warwick

If Youth But Knew (1926) - Dr. Martin Summer

One Colombo Night (1926) - Jim Farnell

These Charming People (1931) - James Berridge

The Shadow Between (1931) - Paul Haddon

Puppets of Fate (1933) - Richard Sabine

Jade (1934, Short) - The Man

The 39 Steps (1935) - Professor Jordan

The Last Journey (1936) - Sir Wilfred Rhodes

East Meets West (1936) - Sir Henry Mallory

Tomorrow We Live (1936) - Sir Charles Hendra

One of Our Aircraft Is Missing (1942) - Sir George Corbett - Rear Gunner in B for Bertie

Tomorrow We Live (1943) - Mayor Pierre Duchesne

Undercover (1943) - Gen. Von Staengel (Military Governor)

The Lamp Still Burns (1943) - Sir Marshall Freyne

Medal for the General (1944) - General Church

The Rake's Progress (1945) - Colonel Robert Kenway

The Beginning or the End (1947) - President Roosevelt

Private Angelo (1949) - Count Piccologrando

White Corridors (1951) - Mr. Groom Sr.

I Believe in You (1952) - Mr. Pyke

Mandy (1952) - Mr. Garland

Decameron Nights (1953) - Ricciardo / Bernabo

The Titfield Thunderbolt (1953) - The Bishop (final film role)

Tuesday Talk - Hot August Knight

Q1: Who likes Neil Diamond? 
Q2: Who remembers this album ?

I loved Neil Diamond back in the 70s - I still do. His are the sort of timeless songs that you can sing along to in the car while driving on a long journey (on your own, probably.) I have very fond memories of H.A.N... sitting in the back garden as dusk falls, bottle (or two) of wine to hand, looking at the trees as they silhouetted against the sky and Neil Diamond on the record player (yep, Vinyl back then!) It seems a lifetime ago now.  I was in my mid-20s...

Me (in the red) and a few 'Saxon' friends 

outside the British Museum way back when.

(The other lady is author and Anglo Saxon historian, Kathleen Herbert

such a dear friend, who encouraged me to write.)

It was hot in July 2018 here in the UK and those hot sultry nights reminded me of the album and those distant August nights ... but this in turn also reminded me of a different night (and yes, it is a very tenuous link, but you are not supposed to notice that!) This sort of Knight...

A particular knight ... King Arthur.  Except he wasn't a knight. He possibly wasn't even a king.
He might have never even existed!

The popular myths of Arthur refer to him as a knight in armour, a godly king overseeing chivalric deeds, the castle of Camelot where jousts were held and blushing maidens blushed beneath their wimples . The Holy Grail, Merlin, Lancelot and Guinevere.

I've never particularly liked any of those tales (Richard Harris in Camelot was a fun movie, but history it wasn't.)  The Arthurian Knights type tales have always seemed so false to me: I guess the 'romance' of those tales just didn't grab me. When I discovered (around the time of Hot August Night) that Arthur, if he had existed would have fitted more accurately into the late 400s early 500s - that period of chaos between the going of the Romans and the coming of the Saxons ... ah that drew my interest! That seemed more plausible! Arthur as a war lord leading bewildered and confused people against these Germanic tribes appearing along the shores of Britain's east coast - and yes, Britain - 'England' wasn't 'Englalond' until the 500/600s when places like Norfolk, Suffolk, Essex, Sussex, Wessex were becoming established - the lands of the North and South Folk, the East, South and West Saxons.... The old belief that the Anglo Saxons pushed the native British (or more likely by then, the Romano-British) back and back into Wales is now debunked. The incomers settled and intermarried and gradually became dominant. Took them a good couple of hundred years or more to do so though. The 'Welsh' of today (and the Cornish and probably more than a few Devonians) are the remnants of those pre-Saxon Britons. "Welsh" is actually an Old English word for 'foreigner'. 

Who was Arthur? Did he exist? If so where was he - Wales, the West Country? Scotland?

There are many, many conjectural non-fiction books expressing a plethora of different opinions about The Matter Of Arthur. One thing  every Arthurianite has in common is that we all have our own set-in-stone (just like Excalibur) ideas of the 'truth' about him and dismiss any one else's ideas as utter nonsense. 

There are as many fictional ideas dealing with the before, during and after supposed 'reign' of King Arthur. For fiction, different ideas are welcomed - there is plenty of room for imaginative stories about Arthur, be they fantasy, futuristic, knights in armour or nearer-the-truth set in the post-Roman period - and I sincerely hope Arthur continues to remain the Once And Future King between the pages of a well-written novel. But as for finding the facts about him... forget it!

I can recommend one very good fictional series: Mary Anne Yarde's Du Lac Chronicles 

"A generation after Arthur Pendragon ruled, Briton lies fragmented into warring kingdoms and principalities. Eighteen-year-old Alden du Lac ruled the tiny kingdom of Cerniw. Now he half-hangs from a wooden pole, his back lashed into a mass of bloody welts exposed to the cold of a cruel winter night. He’s to be executed come daybreak—should he survive that long. When Alden notices the shadowy figure approaching, he assumes death has come to end his pain. Instead, the daughter of his enemy, Cerdic of Wessex, frees and hides him, her motives unclear. Annis has loved Alden since his ill-fated marriage to her Saxon cousin—a marriage that ended in blood and guilt—and she would give anything to protect him. Annis’s rescue of Alden traps them between a brutal Saxon king and Alden’s remaining allies. Meanwhile, unknown forces are carefully manipulating the ruins of Arthur’s legacy."  And of course, there's Mary Stewart's Crystal Cave and The Hollow Hills and Rosemay Sutcliff's Sword At Sunset.

Plus my own trilogy of course!

Once I had discovered him, I fell in love with my Arthur. MY Arthur was the down-to earth sometimes ruthless war lord version. A man who had to fight hard to gain his kingdom and fight even harder to keep it... MY Guinevere (Gwenhwyfar as I call her) has more sense than to go off with a 'loves himself' type knight (sorry, I can't stand Lancelot!) in my story she loves Arthur. Their relationship is turbulent (to put it mildly!) but at heart they respect - and love - each other. They have the good times and the bad to face, they have happiness and tragedy to endure, friends to embrace, enemies to kill. My Arthur, to me, is very real and whether it be hot or not... he will always be MY Hot August Knight. Along with Mr Diamond's wonderful voice.

An excerpt from The Kingmaking

Gwenhwyfar dressed quickly. She began to braid her hair but her fingers shook. Until this moment, she had not regretted the decision to leave her maid behind. She told herself not to be foolish, to stay calm and not worry - her husband would survive. Sensible advice, which she did not take. Abandoning the braids, she left her hair loose, ducked from the tent.

The air was fresh, washed clean by the rain that had fallen earlier in the night. It had ceased an hour since, leaving the sky vaulted bright with speckled stars. Her boots scuffed the clinging wetness from the grass as she walked to where the men were assembling beyond the rows of leather tents.

They parted before her. She heard murmurings as she passed, allowed the glint of a smile to break. She guessed how she must look in this dim, flickering torchlight. She had chosen a simple dress of soft green wool, embroidered at neck, hem and cuff, and a darker cloak. She wore few jewels: Arthur’s ruby ring on her marriage finger and a gold torque around her neck. Her hair, cascading in rippling copper waves over her shoulders and down her back, provided all the finery she needed.

Arthur watched her approach, felt his stomach knot with wanting at the sight of her. A cheer, muted in awareness of possible danger, swelled as he held out his hand to her and brought her to him in an embrace. No soldier watching would deny he would give anything to be in Arthur’s position, to feel that lithe, beautiful body against his own; but then, no soldier would ever allow another to take advantage of their lady.

Grinning, Arthur leapt atop a small hillock that raised him about four feet higher than his men. He helped Gwenhwyfar up to stand beside him, his arm encircling her waist.

“You are putting on weight, my lass,” he said cheerfully as they waited for their audience to settle.

Gwenhwyfar made some flippant answer, turned the subject back to the waiting men. Her heart steadied as Arthur began to talk.

By the Mother! If he should suspect she was carrying a child he would be furious. It had taken all her cunning, all her wits, to accompany him here! As it was, she knew she would have to face his anger when he learnt she had deliberately flouted danger in such a condition. It would make not the slightest difference she was but a few months gone and that the babe was threatened with no more danger than the rest of them. Men were so stubbornly protective in these matters.

Arthur spoke only briefly. He emphasised the necessity for caution, for as little noise as was physically possible. “We have men posted; we are as sure as we can be that not one of Hengest’s scouts will take word to him.” He gestured, and an older, experienced soldier dressed in a simple tunic but wearing a magnificent wolfskin cloak, stepped forward. He carried something in his hand. “Mabon brought a trophy back with him when he came in a short while since.”

The man called Mabon, who had fought with Uthr and now served the old Pendragon's only son, lifted the thing he held. None had doubted Arthur had spoken the truth, but the sight of an enemy scout’s head, still dripping fresh blood, well proved the point.

Arthur's stallion, Eira, was brought up, stamping and snorting, a light excited sweat darkening his arched neck. Arthur swung easily into the saddle and nudged the horse forward, thought again. He reined the animal back, leant from the saddle and scooped Gwenhwyfar up to his level. She laughed, grabbing hold of Eira’s long mane for support. Arthur kissed her and swung her back down to firm ground.

She cried out: “Take care, my Lord! Bring me back a trophy!”

“I will," he answered. "Hengest. Dead, or alive as a captive.”

UK editions
Buy from Amazon

US editions
Buy from Amazon or order from any US bookstore

The Kingmaking in German
Buy from Amazon

NOTE TO SPAMMERS: I like Neil Diamond and I write books - however this blog is NOT a review blog, nor is it a gateway for you to ask me to review your book/ script / song or whatever ...so no more spam please! If you are an author of HISTORICAL FICTION go to DISCOVERING DIAMONDS which IS a review site 

Anne Boleyn’s Little Neck ...

Tuesday Talk - on a Wednesday
 with my guest Kristen McQuinn

Of all the Queens throughout British history, one of the most infamous surely must be Anne Boleyn (c. 1501 - May 19, 1536). Painted throughout history as a temptress, seductress, traitor, and worse, Anne Boleyn has gotten a seriously bad rap. But where does this image of her really come from? Was she really these things? The answer is probably no, not really. Possibly the truth is somewhere in the middle, or maybe we will never know the truth at all. Many historical novelists have had their own interpretations of Anne over the years, and depending on their perceptions, readers are presented with very different people.

A very quick history lesson:

· Much of our basis for how we view Anne Boleyn comes from the letters and documents of Eustace Chapuys, the ambassador for the Holy Roman Emperor, Charles V.

·   Chapuys’s job was literally to report what he heard at Henry VIII’s court, including about Anne, much of which came from her enemies. His actual letters reported others’ words, not necessarily his own.

·   The Holy Roman Emperor was Catherine of Aragon’s nephew, so he was naturally inclined to dislike Anne based on her replacement and treatment of his aunt. Often, he referred to Anne as “the Concubine,” which was recorded in letters to and from Chapuys.

·   Chapuys didn’t like Protestants or the French. At all. Anne was both Protestant and had French mannerisms, so it’s easy to see why historians think he hated her.

·   Chapuys and another man, Pedro Ortiz, exchanged a lot of letters in the course of their duties and the two might have become conflated over time. Ortiz was Catherine of Aragon’s proctor in Rome. HE REALLY loathed Anne, and his letters do actually prove it. Chapuys’s letters are fairly unbiased.

·   Chapuys only met Anne once, in April of 1535. All his other information about her came from other sources, including her enemies.

·   Chapuys was one of the only people who publically stated that he thought Anne was innocent of the charges brought against her and was a victim of political machinations.

·  Regardless of politics, Anne was unpopular. Her failure to have a son gave Henry VIII the impetus he was looking for to have Thomas Cromwell charge her with adultery, incest, and treason.

·    Adultery, when one is married to the king, is high treason, punishable by death.

·     Five other men were charged with Anne and executed.

One scene that is often seized upon by authors occurs during Anne’s tenure in the Tower. While she was held in the Tower, both before and after her trial and sentencing, she was attended by Mary Kingston, the wife of the Tower constable, Sir William Kingston. The conversations Kingston recorded and reported to Cromwell were used at that time to seal Anne’s fate, as well as that of the five other men who were executed with her. Today, Kingston’s letters are considered among the most important bits of evidence that Anne and the others were totally innocent. In a letter written May 19, 1536, the morning of Anne’s execution, Kingston wrote:

This morning she sent for me, that I might be with her at such time as she received the good Lord, to the intent I should hear her speak as touching her innocency alway to be clear. And in the writing of this she sent for me, and at my coming she said, 'Mr. Kingston, I hear I shall not die afore noon, and I am very sorry therefore, for I thought to be dead by this time and past my pain.' I told her it should be no pain, it was so little. And then she said, 'I heard say the executioner was very good, and I have a little neck,' and then put her hands about it, laughing heartily. I have seen many men and also women executed, and that they have been in great sorrow, and to my knowledge this lady has much joy in death. Sir, her almoner is continually with her, and had been since two o'clock after midnight.

This statement serves as the focal point for many interpretations of Anne’s behavior in various novel, TV, and film adaptations. On a surface reading of Kingston’s letter, we might assume that he thought her actions to be aberrant, considering that he noted other condemned prisoners had displayed “great sorrow” at their impending demise, but Anne instead had “much joy in death.” However, a closer look indicates that he isn’t actually offering a commentary on Anne’s state of mind. He is merely observing what his charge is doing, as his job requires, like a doctor charts a patient’s progress. There is no judgment in Kingston’s letter. To the contrary, the letter implies he is a compassionate jailer. He attempts to calm her fears about any pain she will face during her execution, which he didn’t have to do. Perhaps he was kind to her because he believed she was innocent. We may never know, but writers certainly have their views on the matter. Two popular historical novelists, Margaret George and Alison Weir, have each tackled this scene, with very different results.

In Margaret George’s novel The Autobiography of Henry VIII, the scene in the Tower is unsettling to Kingston, who is distracted by preparations he must oversee for the executions. Kingston is on the verge of exhaustion, frazzled by the multitude of administrative functions he has to fulfill, and is perturbed by the lack of instructions from Henry VIII about Anne’s coffin. “Dawn came before five, and Master Kingston was already exhausted from the tasks of the day ahead. …[H]e naturally had many details of both practicality and protocol to attend to. … He was running late. … But still no word about the coffin!” Kingston, when he goes to Anne’s rooms to deliver news of her delayed execution, is relieved by it because it gives him more time to carry out his other duties. When he speaks to Anne, he’s obviously in two places at once and has to be force himself to pay attention to her. When she speaks, Anne’s dialogue is consistent with Kingston’s description in his letter to the king. 

Upon learning of the delay, Ms. George describes Anne as disappointed and sad. Anne goes on to comment that she thought by noon to be past her pain. But then she grabs Kingston’s arm and whispers frantically to him that she is innocent. Abruptly, she has another mood swing and asks him fearfully if her death will be painful. Her volatile swings in mood make her seem mentally unstable, which at the time could also imply her guilt. This version of Anne is worried about how big the executioner’s axe is: “I have a little neck. … But the axe is so thick, and rough.” Upon learning that she was to be beheaded by a swordsman, she laughed, saying that Henry was ever a good and gentle sovereign lord. That, friends, is what I like to call sarcasm. Her laugh is described as “that hideous, raucous laughter,” like a witch’s cackle, and Kingston is thoroughly unnerved by it. Her laughter again starts up when she jokes to Kingston that she will be known as Queen Anne Lack-Head. Here, her laughter is described as “shrieking,” and Kingston is actually frightened by it, all but fleeing her Tower chambers.

The overtones of witchcraft, overlaid with her added comments about Henry making her a martyr, underscore the implied mental instability implicit in the text, neatly tying up the issue of her unsuitability to be queen. All told, her mannerisms combine to create a character that is unsympathetic, severing any lingering tender feelings readers may have had for her. Given that this novel is told from Henry’s perspective, it makes sense for Ms. George to make Boleyn a character that readers no longer like at this point. We are seeing her through his eyes, and by now, he truly believed that she was guilty and had wronged him grievously.

In Alison Weir’s novel, Anne Boleyn: A King’s Obsession, readers get another interpretation of Anne’s famous “little neck” comment. Right away, the novel has a decidedly favorable bias towards Anne, whereas the other two either did not. From the moment Anne arrives at the Tower, concessions are made to her rank as queen: “At least, as queen, she would be properly attended…” Her clothes were richly described, and pomp and ceremony were seen to more so than in other novels. Kingston is referred to as the “Gentleman Jailer of the Tower,” making him sound as though he is a courtier there to wait upon her and lending more dignity to Anne’s imprisonment than it would have had otherwise. After her sentencing, Kingston was more forthcoming with Anne and was very gentle, taking time to talk with her and answer any questions she asked of him, acting very much the gentleman indeed. When he informed Anne of the time of her execution, she was relieved, for she had just been forced at Henry’s order to watch from the Tower the executions of the other five men. Kingston showed no hint that her relief was aberrant, as in other interpretations. Here, Anne is described as “agitated and panicky” when her execution is delayed. This seems the more natural reaction in the two novels. Who among us hasn’t been agitated and panicky over facing something that we are dreading and have no choice to go through with? Hysteria and inappropriate reactions seem the most logical explanation. Anne has spent days dwelling on the fact that she’s going to die by having her head cut off. She is asking a normal question to a person who is a logical choice, having witnessed many executions in his line of work. Anne says, as we know, that she had hoped to be past her pain, because she’s been brooding about it and the suspense is eating her alive. Kingston is quick to reassure her it will be painless.

When Anne says, “I have heard you say the executioner is very good, and I have a little neck,” she gives a nervous laugh afterwards. Of course she is nervous. She’s beyond nervous; she’s petrified. But she is also acknowledging Kingston’s role as a figure who has given her succor, because he was the one who told her about the swordsman from Calais, and that he was skilled and humane. Kingston went out of his way to try to calm her, without judgment. She explains to him that she wants to die now but her body “shrinks from it, so I am heartily glad it will be over quickly” and Kingston assures her it will be, and squeezes her hand kindly. This is a very human moment for both of them, the most poignant and touching of the entire book, to be honest. This is a woman who went from being a queen to taking comfort from the man who will lead her to her execution. More so than any other scene, this is truly the full circle moment for Anne.

There is a reason why novelists continue to write about the Tudors. Yes, in part it is because the books will sell. But more than that, there is still a deep current of compassion we feel towards the people then, a desire to understand their motives and thoughts, and to better understand ourselves through them. Anne Boleyn remains a tragic figure - hated by some, beloved by others, mysterious in many ways to all. Her story encompasses so much depth that it is hard to look away, regardless of how one views her. Nearly 500 years after her death, the lingering controversy, intrigue, and curiosity surrounding Anne Boleyn may be the best elegy she could have asked for.

© Kristen McQuinn

References:

Bordo, Susan. “When Fictionalized Facts Matter.” The Chronicle Review, 6 May 2012. Retrieved from https://www.chronicle.com/article/When-Fictionalized-Facts/131759

George, Margaret. The Autobiography of Henry VIII, With Notes by His Fool, Will Somers. St. Martin’s Griffin, 1987.

Hibbert, Christopher. Tower of London: A History of London from the Norman Conquest. Newsweek Publications, 1971.

Mantel, Hillary. “Anne Boleyn: Witch, Bitch, Temptress, Feminist.” The Guardian, 11 May 2012. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/books/2012/may/11/hilary-mantel-on-anne-boleyn

Mantel, Hillary. Bring Up the Bodies. Henry Holt and Co., 2012.

McKay, Lauren. “Did Eustace Chapuys really despise Anne Boleyn?” HistoryExtra.com, 6 May 2016. Retrieved from https://www.historyextra.com/period/tudor/did-eustace-chapuys-really-despise-anne-boleyn/

Weir, Alison. Anne Boleyn: A King’s Obsession. Ballantine Books, 2017.

< previous Voyaging Round the Blogs with Helen Hollick and a pirate or two...