Henry VIII: King and Court - Softcover

Weir, Alison

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0099532425 ISBN 13: 9780099532422

Publisher: Vintage, 2008

Synopsis

'This magnificent biography of Henry VIII is set against the cultural, social and political background of his court - the most spectacular court ever seen in England - and the splendour of his many sumptuous palaces.

An entertaining narrative packed with colourful description and a wealth of anecdotal evidence, but a comprehensive analytical study of the development of both monarch and court during a crucial period in English history. As well as challenging some recent theories, it offers controversial new conclusions based on contemporary evidence that has until now been overlooked. This is a triumph of historical writing which will appeal equally to the general reader and the serious historian.

About this title

Review:

Henry VIII (1491-1547) casts a long shadow over English royalty and biography alike. In Henry VIII: King and Court, Alison Weir takes on this forbidding reputation to produce an admirably detailed, if somewhat cumbersome, biography of a king who married six times and presided over England's cataclysmic split with Roman Catholicism. Weir's main task is to overturn the "caricature" of Henry "as a man who thought of nothing but chasing the ladies, and who threw chicken bones over his shoulder". This seems a rather obvious characterisation to challenge, but Weir proceeds to amass an extraordinary wealth of detail about Henry's cultivated court, from its learning, architecture and political machinations, to how many people handled Henry's bedsheets and the food that his horses ate. The early sections get bogged down in too much detail, and detract from the political drama of Henry's growing estrangement from his first wife, Katherine of Aragon, and his fateful marriage to Anne Boleyn in 1532. The second section is much more convincing in tracing how "the young, idealist humanist with liberal ideas about kingship was giving way to a selfish, dogmatic tyrant", as Henry dispenses with Wolsey, Sir Thomas More, Anne and then Cromwell, and the court increasingly sinks into factionalism and intrigue.

Weir's biography is a lively recreation of the everyday life of Henry, his court and what he called his "ill-conditioned wives", but it neglects the wider European dimensions of Henry's reign, and sweeps over many crucial aspects of the split with Rome. Detailed and scholarly, Henry VIII: King and Court provides a strangely colourless portrait of the most colourful of English monarchs. --Jerry Brotton

Review:

"A glittering evocation of the Tudor Court, its splendour as well as its vulgarity...a responsive, rounded portrait" (Daily Telegraph)

"A compelling, readable account of the life and times of the king who put England firmly on the map of power politics... Good history books ought to change the way we look at ourselves and our nation's past. Henry VIII: King and Court is one such book" (Lisa Jardine Literary Review)

"Weir provides immense satisfaction. She writes in a pacy, vivid style, engaging the heart as well as the mind" (Amanda Foreman Independent)

About this edition

• Publisher: Vintage
• Publication date: 2008
• ISBN 10: 0099532425
• ISBN 13: 9780099532422
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 656