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Anna's Reviews > The King's Curse
The King's Curse (The Plantagenet and Tudor Novels, #7)
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A beautifully and thoughtfully written novel about Lady Margaret Pole who was the guardian of Prince Arthur and Katherine of Aragon in Ludlow Castle, and subsequently ran the household of Princess Mary. She was of royal (Plantagenet) lineage, being the niece of the Yorkist king Edward VI and Richard III. She is portrayed as a strong, courageous lady who managed to survive until the grand age of 67 in the dangerous times of Henry VIII.
It is wonderful and refreshing to see a very well researched and presented novel of the death throes of the "Old Church" in England (the Roman Catholic Church), as this beloved institution was systematically plundered and destroyed by the increasingly paranoid and tyrannical Henry VIII and his vile, self serving minion, Thomas Cromwell. It details the suffering of the ordinary people who had their religion taken from them, and with it the care of the sick and needy and hospitality for travellers who would always be welcomed in the guest accommodation of the abbeys which covered our country. When, to the horror and outrage of most of his loyal subjects, this king set himself up as Head of the Church in England in order to put aside his legal wife and to marry a commoner, Anne Boleyn, all the old religious houses were pillaged to fill the coffers of this rapacious king and given as gifts to his sycophants and friends, while the ordinary people who had given their lives to God were turned out onto the streets to beg for their survival.
We also learn of the 'Pilgrimage of Grace", a mass peaceful protest by thousands of ordinary citizens in the north of England to beg for their churches to be given back to them. While Henry promised pardon to all, he subsequently ordered his henchmen to slaughter a great many of those same people; this is a king who does NOT keep his word and who takes out his rage on his own subjects.
It is not often that history is described from the perspective of the 'losers'; (as we all know, history is nearly always written by the victors), and I hope that this wonderful novel gives people an insight into the suffering of both the ordinary and grand folk of England who simply wanted to keep to the faith they had always known, only to see it destroyed.
A beautifully written and very moving book.
It is wonderful and refreshing to see a very well researched and presented novel of the death throes of the "Old Church" in England (the Roman Catholic Church), as this beloved institution was systematically plundered and destroyed by the increasingly paranoid and tyrannical Henry VIII and his vile, self serving minion, Thomas Cromwell. It details the suffering of the ordinary people who had their religion taken from them, and with it the care of the sick and needy and hospitality for travellers who would always be welcomed in the guest accommodation of the abbeys which covered our country. When, to the horror and outrage of most of his loyal subjects, this king set himself up as Head of the Church in England in order to put aside his legal wife and to marry a commoner, Anne Boleyn, all the old religious houses were pillaged to fill the coffers of this rapacious king and given as gifts to his sycophants and friends, while the ordinary people who had given their lives to God were turned out onto the streets to beg for their survival.
We also learn of the 'Pilgrimage of Grace", a mass peaceful protest by thousands of ordinary citizens in the north of England to beg for their churches to be given back to them. While Henry promised pardon to all, he subsequently ordered his henchmen to slaughter a great many of those same people; this is a king who does NOT keep his word and who takes out his rage on his own subjects.
It is not often that history is described from the perspective of the 'losers'; (as we all know, history is nearly always written by the victors), and I hope that this wonderful novel gives people an insight into the suffering of both the ordinary and grand folk of England who simply wanted to keep to the faith they had always known, only to see it destroyed.
A beautifully written and very moving book.
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