‘Master Cromwell, you think because you are a councillor you can negotiate with heretics, behind the king’s back. You are wrong. I know about your letters that come and go to Stephen Vaughan, I know he has met with Tyndale.’ ‘Are you threatening me? I’m just interested.’ ‘Yes,’ More says sadly. ‘Yes, that is precisely what I am doing.’ He sees that the balance of power has shifted between them: not as officers of state, but as men.
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Welcome to Wolf Crawl. I am your guide, Simon Haisell, and this is a year-long slow read of Hilary Mantel’s Cromwell trilogy: Wolf Hall, Bring Up the Bodies, and The Mirror and the Light.
Each week, I dive into the details, with summaries, background, footnotes and tangents to enrich your reading. I am joined on this journey by Bea Stitches, who delves into the archive on our behalf, and Matt Brown, who makes maps to help us find our way through Cromwell’s world.
You can find the reading schedule and plot summaries for the full cast of characters on my website, Footnotes and Tangents. There, you can join other slow reads, including Leo Tolstoy’s War and Peace, Midnight’s Children by Salman Rushdie and Pat Barker’s Regeneration.
I start each post with a summary of the week’s story, illustrated by a map created by Matt Brown. This week, we are reading the first half of Part Four. Chapter II. ‘Alas, What Shall I Do For Love?’ Spring, 1532.
UK Fourth Estate edition, pp. 338–384
US Picador, pp. 312–354
US Henry Holt, pp. 277-314 (guide only, editions vary)
Ben Miles audiobook, 12:47:30–14:44:17
First Line: Time now to consider the compacts that hold the world together…
Last Line: This girl, you know, she claims she can raise the dead.
This summary is followed by a few footnotes of interest.
This week, we explore the world made by old men in counting houses, balancing the books, and baking the perfect spiced wafers. We run with Jezebel and the wild dogs, divide and rule, and bag ourselves two big fish from the Thames. In the archives with Bea Stitches, Bea finds poetry in Thomas Avery’s account books, and in the haunting of Wolf Hall, we consider the memory burned on the body.
And then it is over to you. In the comments, let us know what caught your eye and ask the group any questions you may have. And if you’ve tumbled down a rabbit hole or taken your reading off on a tangent, please share where you have been and what you have found.
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