Anne Boleyn: A New Life of England's Tragic Queen [ペーパーバック]

This makes me want to reread my Tudor biographies and histories. One of the most amusing things about reading history is seeing the number of different ways various writers can spin the same facts. This is interestingly contrary to much of what I have read; the support for Denny's assertions varies in quality and the work has serious flaws. I would not read this either as a first or only biography of Anne Boleyn, but it raises thought-provoking issues of sources and interpretations.

Denny seems to have done a great deal of research. She also cites some original sources that I don't believe I've seen referenced before, uses others that are often ignored, and points out flaws in others. In common with most histories, I think it is insufficiently documented: what is "common knowledge" to the historians of a period may be virtually unknown to the general public. I think that if there are, say six historic documents attesting to the same fact, the helpful historian will cite at least one of them as an example. It is also my inflexible rule that where there are quote marks, there should be a citation.

It is the interpretation of facts that is open to question. Denny brings up the issue of Anne's possibly having a stepmother, which I thought had been a dead issue for about 70 years. She also argues that Anne had auburn hair (well perhaps VERY dark auburn hair and questions the authenticity of any portrait with a gable headdress. She also portrays Henry VIII as very promiscuous, when most historians argue that he was actually relatively chaste and discreet for a king, more of a serial monogamist, and did most of his straying at times when his wife was unavailable for sex.

Denny, one gathers, is an Evangelical and she sometimes gets rather vitriolic. I believe it was enough to describe certain fraudulent relics, without adding the opinion that "This proves that the Church ignored biblical warnings against idolatry ... " complete with references to Bible verses. This, of course, is no worse than those who assert that all Evangelicals were self-serving hypocrites, but I'd rather have balance than a second wrong.

I am of two minds about authors who are so clear about their own point of view on issues. On the one hand, it casts doubt upon their ability to make reasoned interpretations, on the other, at least one knows where they stand. Using carefully neutral language is no guarantee of being unbiased.

There has been a tendency to view Anne as a grasping seductress and superficial party girl, at least up until shortly before her death. When I first read that one of her silkwomen complained that during Anne's time, the court had not been so frivolous, I felt cheated that this was not in any biography that I had previously read. Ives argues in his monumental work that standard scenario whereby Anne's relationship with Henry is supposed to have deteriorated steadily (based mainly on certain of Chapuys' letters) is wrong and ignores many contradictory statements in other letters. Denny makes much of the argument that Chapuy had little access to court and understood English only poorly. This does not mean that his information was all wrong, Denny recounts that he had a string of informants (as any good ambassador does), but this does mean that his information was less reliable than if it were first hand. [added 5/2/2010: Even it Chapuys did not speak English, one supposes that he probably spoke Latin, as most educated people did, so he would be able to talk to some people in that language, widening his contacts.]

Another problem is that Catharine of Aragon preferred to assert that her marriage with Henry was reasonably happy and that Anne was entirely responsible for leading him astray: without Anne, Henry would never have considered an annulment or behaved so badly to his wife and daughter. One can think of several reasons why she would say so, among them the common desire to blame all marital discord on a villainous outsider rather than one's own, at least equally guilty, spouse. I think that many people have accepted this view too uncritically. Henry's brutality even after Anne's death has been laid to her corruption of his character. I think that the judicial murder of two of his father's unpopular tax collectors as part of his coronation festivities at 18 makes this interpretation questionable. Denny chiefly blames Henry for his own conduct, and I think rightly so.

I have always found it difficult to believe that Anne's initial refusal of Henry was with the intention of causing him to abandon Catharine of Aragon. As Denny says, "No one could ever have imagined that a king could put aside wife of 20 years' standing, and with such high foreign connections, for an unknown Englishwomen." I have always believed that for whatever reason, Anne really wasn't willing to be his mistress. I therefore find Denny's interpretation of Anne as a truly pious and virtuous woman plausible and give Denny high marks for the rare look at Anne as she might have seen herself. She wasn't "the other woman" if Henry really wasn't married to Catharine. I don't know how to prove her inmost thoughts. I find the positive portrayal of Anne's father interesting: he is usually portrayed as being so cold and self-serving as to be almost a psychopath, but reading this makes me recall that most of those portrayals are not well-documented. Likewise, I have never thought that Jane's undisputed conduct was virtuous, so I like Denny's interpretation.

As to Thomas More, I think he has been all too thoroughly idolized as a selfless, otherworldly saint. He was brilliant and had numerous virtues, but I am baffled how someone presented as being so utterly without worldy ambition could have become Chancellor of England. Indeed, I wonder that there were any little Mores; one might think that he would have spent all his time living in a cave flogging himself through a hair shirt. I think that it is fine that Denny points out his unattractive qualities that are so often glossed over, but again, I would have preferred balance rather than another one-sided portrayal.

Lastly, Catharine of Aragon; I think people have an unfortunate tendency to view all conflicts as a battle between good and evil. Therefore if Anne is good, Catharine must be bad, and vice versa. I actually believe that it is possible that both women saw themselves as virtuous guardians of religious truth, and to respect both of them. From all accounts that I have seen, Catharine carried out her duties as Queen to the best of her very considerable abilities: generously supporting education, encouraging new craft industries, serving as an able regent. The English people loved her. I think Denny oversteps in insisting that Catharine "ought" to have be willing to give up Henry and that fighting for her marriage (and her daughter's inheritance) bordered on treason. It is one thing to criticize her if she discussed an invasion of England with the Emperor, but to fault her for seeking his advice and legal assistance when the annulment proceedings were first announced is unreasonable. Likewise, faulting Mary for her "unnatural" anger with his father over the sufferings he inflicted on her and her mother is incredibly unfair.

There is a lengthy bibliography and 16 pages of plates (probably about 30 images) I am a little surprised at the complaint by one reviewer about the number of Victorian images. About 6 seem to be 18th or 19th century. Most are clearly identified as such, and their flaws sometimes pointed out. Two, one of jousting and one of smuggling Bibles, are not clear; they are labelled as being at least set in the early 16th century, but appear to me to be in a later style. I don't think they are used in a manner that is misleading.

Where do I start? The premise, for one: Anne Boleyn's reputation has hardly suffered; she has unfortunately and inaccurately emerged as a romantic heroine. The vitriol dates back to Sander, writing in the reign of Elizabeth. Even Friedmann, with his opaque Victorian sensibilities, offers a modicum of respect, however grudging. George Wyatt, the poet's grandson, was the earliest, and very sympathetic, biographer. Hence, this much vaunted reappraisal is a few hundred years out of date. Indeed, the tone is hagiographic, which adds nothing to objective historical debate. Only in the realm of fiction do we glimpse a shallow, coarse and unsavoury Anne Boleyn ('The Other Boleyn Girl', 'Queen of Subtleties').

Denny's writing style is unfortunate, employing simplistic, girlish language, and incorrect word usage. "Illegitimating" is a word? Who would write such a word? Where were her editors? Disconcerting, also, is Denny's excessive use of quotations, giving the impression of laziness; historians must sift through primary and secondary materials and draw logical, supportable arguments - not merely regurgitate. She translates a letter written by a very young Anne Boleyn from French to English, and unfortunately makes it comprehensible. The original is exceptionally difficult, rife with bizarre, idiomatic expressions - a fascinating glimpse into Anne Boleyn's progress with a language she would later master.

The author has a poor grasp of source materials and re-interprets secondary evidence very loosely. For example, she twists Plowden ('Tudor Women') to an alarming degree in supporting a negative interpretation of Katherine of Aragon's character. The latter is labelled "arrogant, stubborn and bloody-minded", but Denny neglects to tell us that observation came from Henry's partisan supporters, which Plowden does. Why shouldn't the daughter of renowned princes be so if told she had been a whore for almost 20 years, and her beloved child was a bastard. What was she supposed to feel? Jane Seymour's character is cattily dismissed in a few prejudiced sentences. And that is the major problem with Denny: Anne is good, everyone who opposed her is bad. Thomas More is simply a foul mouthed masochist; no mention of his courageous convictions. Katherine is a manipulative liar; we will never know the truth about either her virginity or first pregnancy. Henry is "promiscuous" and a "philanderer" - hardly. Henry had few mistresses, and appeared to be more of a serial monogamist. Indeed, his emotional entanglements seem the product of too much gallantry, and not enough reality. Just compare him with Francis I.

The principles in this drama were so fascinating and multi-dimensional that to dismiss them so is a travesty. Denny makes the cardinal error of dragging her own religious prejudices into the mix, making her less than objective in examining one of the most intriguing events in English history.

Unfortunately, Anne Boleyn suffers, becoming flat and frilly. Her brilliance, ambition, temper, political acumen and vindictiveness, qualities which render her complex and three dimensional, are glossed over. She is pure, virtuous, a wonderful mother, saintly and - ugh - a victim. What happened to the able politician, the religious scholar/reformer, the wit and charisma? Impossible: a boring Anne Boleyn. Yes, Denny states she was intelligent, cultured, etc, but never supports the argument with concrete examples. And that is another difficulty: statements are made, never followed through logically; merely dropped. Maddeningly disorganized. Worse yet, Denny engages in the dangerous sport of presupposing intimate knowledge of the queen's inner motives and inclinations. That must remain a novelist's jurisdiction; we have no evidence regarding her mind and emotions.

Due to a poor grasp of documentary evidence and recent research, Denny makes glaring, sometimes bizarre errors. To name the simplest:

The stepmother myth was based on a misreading by Agnes Strickland (mid 19thC) of the Howard rolls (she relied on an inaccurate source). At the Howard aisle of Lambeth, Elizabeth Howard, Countess of Wiltshire, is buried. Date? 1538, not 1512. Sargent addressed the stepmother notion during the 1930s, yet does not appear in the limited bibliography.

Denny changes Anne Boleyn's colouring based on a Holbein drawing of a man labelled "Ormond", whom she believes to be Thomas Boleyn - a common error. Unfortunately, this is probably James Butler; at one point, while Holbein lived in England, both men held the title. Thomas Boleyn was in his fifties when he acquired the title; this is a much younger man. Also, the drawing does not resemble Thomas Boleyn's brass in St. Peter's. All contemporary descriptions of the queen mention her expressive black eyes and lustrous dark hair. Wolsey called her "the night crow". Not pretty, but evocative and exotic. Here, suddenly, she has reddish hair and hazel eyes. The NPG version is not contemporary and, although charming and lively, is by a lesser hand.

Doyne C. Bell's account of the Victorian renovations at St. Peter ad Vincula are also held suspect: Denny hints Anne Boleyn's corpse might have been removed (as did Norah Loft, the romance writer in her picture book biography). I own the Bell account, and find no incompatibility between the described skeleton and Anne Boleyn's appearance (based on comparisons with maternal relatives and Elizabeth). The skeleton was supposedly of a woman between 25 and 30, but with primitive forensic techniques, and Anne Boleyn being accepted as born in 1507, errors were likely. Little known fact: traces of elm wood - the infamous arrow chest - were found amongst the scattered bones.

To her credit, Denny dismisses the sixth finger nonsense, although George Wyatt mentioned a small deformity of one nail. Nothing extraordinary. It was the Catholic Sander who deserves blame for Anne Boleyn's alleged deformities. No-one who saw her described her as a physical monster.

And why so many cheesy, Victorian illustrations? Even famous works are represented by later, inferior copies. Credit them as later fantasies; only a few are properly identified. Anachronistic and sentimental. Why reproduce a letter from Henry VIII not written in his own hand?

Save your money. Read Ives' revised biography. Or, for something truly controversial, try Warnicke. Dr. Warnicke advances some outlandish theories, which I cannot support, but her arguments are well researched, cogent, and compelling. This book, however, adds nothing to the debate, and simply goes over old ground. And not very well. Denny is simply a poor historian.

I understand Denny has written a biography of Anne Boleyn's cousin, Katherine Howard. Considering how little is known of her, the prospect is disheartening; just because Denny's ancestor served in court, it does not give her special knowledge.

This is probably the worst biography of Anne Boleyn I have ever read, and I've read lots of them.

Denny spends most of her time flogging several very dead horses. She seems to think that most people actually believe the charges of adultery brought against Anne, which ultimately led to her execution. From my extensive reading on the subject, I find that most people, whether they are admirers of Anne or not, don't believe the claims. In fact a number of biographers have taken the pains to point out that based on actual Tudor court records, many of Anne's so-called lovers were not even in the same county as she during their alleged trysts. Almost all experts agree that Henry executed Anne on "trumped-up" charges, so why is Denny so passionate in insisting that Anne was innocent? She appears to be unaware that she is "preaching to the choir"!

She also makes a strenuous effort to paint Anne as motivated by nothing but selfless devotion to the newly emerging evangelical faith. True, Anne's sympathies did appear to lie with the Reformers, but was her motivation pure devotion to her religious beliefs? I think Anne was far more complex than that, she was also ambitious, willful, eager to raise her family's social standing, etc. But Denny will have none of that. She will not even consider that part of Anne's "devotion" to Protestantism was the fact that her rival, Catherine of Aragon, was a devout Catholic and thus backed by the "Catholic faction" at court and abroad.

Which brings me to the part of the book which disturbed me most. The book informs the reader that Denny has degrees in several fields, including theology. One has to wonder where on earth she received her theology degree?? Her bias against any and all Catholics--and the Catholic Church itself--is shockingly extreme. Of course she is entitled to her own theological views, but it is unthinkable for any serious historian or biographer to make her own prejudices so evident. And "prejudice" is not too strong a word--in fact, it is hardly strong enough. Denny shreds the characters of every Catholic in the book--Catherine of Aragon (whom she criticizes for refusing to be cast aside by her husband, King Henry!), the pope, nuns and priests whom she paints in the most lurid colors, accusing them of every vice under the sun, and as for poor Sir Thomas More---well, one has to wonder how he ever managed to become a saint. Denny portrays him as nasty, deceitful, amoral and, yes, a "pervert"--in her words, a "sadomasochist". Because he wore a hair shirt beneath his fine court clothing (a medieval practice intended to induce humility and piety in the wearer) she leaps to the assertion that he thoroughly enjoyed being flogged--by his own daughter!!!

Martin Luther himself never showed as much disgust for the Catholic Church as Denny does. She appears to think that the Reformation is still ongoing and that Protestants and Catholics must use any weapon handy to bludgeon the other side into defeat. (Well, at least, those evil and perverted Catholics!)

Was there corruption in the Catholic Church during Anne Boleyn's lifetime? Absolutely, and if Denny had merely pointed out the recognized abuses, she would only be doing her job as a historian. But she is not content to do that. Her belief seems to be that the Church was (and is) corrupt and un-Godly to the core--that the outward corruptions were just the obvious signs of the rot within. I cannot recall ever reading a supposedly "historical biography" which showed such venom towards a particular religion.

I actually had to re-read a number of passages to make sure that I wasn't just becoming paranoid!

Like I said, though, Denny is welcome to her own beliefs--and frankly, she can keep her book, too.

If you want to read some scurrilous attacks on the Catholic Church, there are some readily available "religious" tracts which I can assure you are much cheaper. And frankly, much more honest in their own way than in this supposed work of history.