Wolf Hall

Originally published in the Ketchikan Daily News, September 2015; written by Lisa Pearson.

There have been many times when a film adaptation has made me curious about the original book, but I’ve never watched anything that drove me to the shelves faster than “Wolf Hall”. This 6-hour BBC miniseries is based on Hilary Mantel’s 2009 novel and its sequel “Bring up the bodies”. Told from the point of view of Thomas Cromwell, the son of an abusive blacksmith who rose steadily to become Lord Great Chamberlain under Henry VIII, Wolf Hall portrays the events leading up to King Henry VIII’s divorce from his first wife Catherine of Aragon, subsequent marriage to Anne Boleyn, and her eventual execution.

In the case of the books, Mantel does a wonderful job of bringing 16th-century society to life and giving the reader a true appreciation of how precarious wealth and security could be at that time. This is most clearly illustrated when Henry VIII is injured at a jousting tournament and is briefly presumed dead. For those few moments, everyone in the room is calculating whom best to align themselves with: which powerful figures will fall, which men lurking on the edges of court will seize the advantage. At that point, there was even a question of who would be the heir to the throne. Fortunes could turn on an instant, especially with the religious upheaval that was going on throughout Europe.

The Reformation is almost a character in itself in these stories, and you get a real sense of how nuanced the differences could be between ideologies. Was printing a Bible in the vernacular a heresy? What was the true nature of redemption? Could the King of England reject the authority of the sitting Pope and still be loyal to the Church? And - most importantly - were these differences worth dying for? The parts of Mantel’s books I found most involving were those dealing with the struggle over doctrine and belief, and the characters of the people who were involved. The books definitely side with the reformers: Archbishop Thomas Cranmer, Cardinal Wolsey and Thomas Cromwell. They come across as reasonable and low-key, as opposed to Mantel’s depiction of Sir Thomas More. In Wolf Hall, More is an unyielding zealot who imprisons, tortures, and burns those he suspects of bringing Lutheran ideals into England.

The relationship between Cromwell and More is very interesting, as mutual suspicion battles with mutual respect. They are on opposite sides in the question of Henry VIII’s divorce, and yet they both recognize the intelligence and cunning in each other. More suspects Cromwell of heretical leanings, but does not openly investigate. Later, when More’s star has fallen and he is imprisoned in the Tower of London, Cromwell is frustrated at More’s unwillingness to help himself win the King’s forgiveness. The actors who portray Cromwell and More in the BBC adaptation do a wonderful job with this interplay, and many of the wittier lines in the miniseries were taken directly from the book.

Once you have seen and/or read Wolf Hall, I recommend looking at the other side of the coin. Paul Scofield won an Academy Award in 1966 for his soulful portrayal of Sir Thomas More in the film “A Man for All Seasons”. Based on the play by Robert Bolt, this movie shows More as a saintly man dedicated to his principles and reluctantly drawn into court politics. I suspect the truth lies somewhere between these extremes, but both Wolf Hall and A Man for All Seasons are wonderfully done, with very subtle performances, and they both deserve watching.

Power struggles between the French and Spanish, Papal politics, Henry VIII’s first three wives, epidemics, revenge, court politics, illicit marriages and legal hair-splitting are all part of Mantel’s two books and they keep the story rolling along with one interesting point after another. In fact, you might well find yourself searching out the section of the library dealing with Tudor England (Dewey Decimal number 942.05) just to get more information about this fascinating period.