Wolf Crawl #17: Words, words, just words

Audley asks for a seat for the prisoner, but More twitches to the edge of it: keyed up, combative.
   He glances around to check that someone is taking notes for him.
   Words, words, just words.
   He thinks, I remembered you, Thomas More, but you didn’t remember me. You never even saw me coming.

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Further Resources: Hilary Mantel | Wolf Hall

Welcome to week 17 of 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 & the Light.

Each week, I dive into the detail 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, Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe, and Hilary Mantel’s A Place of Greater Safety.

I start each post with a summary of the week’s story illustrated by a map created by Matt Brown. This week, we finish Wolf Hall by reading the second half of Part Six. Chapter II. The Map of Christendom, 1534–1535 and Chapter III. To Wolf Hall, July 1535.

In the UK Fourth Estate edition, this section runs from pages 620 to 650. In the US Picador edition, it runs from pages 575 to 604. It begins, “The Duke of Norfolk comes to visit him…” It ends, “Wolf Hall.”

This summary is followed by a few footnotes of interest.

This week, it all ends in slaughter, with two dukes on the run, mayhem in Münster and the king’s hair in retreat. We consider the Charterhouse traitors and the map of Christendom. Then, Bea takes us into the archives and in the haunting of Wolf Hall, we, the living, chase the dead. We end with my favourite quote of the week.

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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