Watching Wolf Hall
How little has changed
I had read Hilary Mantel’s books and knew what to expect. But in between reading them and the release of the series, I wrote my novel, Behold the Bird in Flight, and I have been struck by the lack of change in 300 years.
In my novel, Isabelle is abducted from her fiancé by King John. Historically, no one is quite sure why he abducted her, but as a fiction writer, I had to create a reason. Because in 1200, poems about courtly love were in fashion, I made her a romantic. Her desire for her fiancé’s love was not the norm: men arranged marriages for dowries and children. To encourage love, Isi chose to flirt with John and make her fiancé jealous. Bad decision.
My invention gave her the agency she’d need in the English court, but in real life, it’s more likely her father pressured her into the marriage to gain the king’s help in a power struggle over land. Typical. Men handed women off to marriage like packages. They also wrote history. Chronicler Matthew Parris said, “she ought to be called a wicked Jezebel, rather than Isabel.” He blamed her for keeping King John in bed, making him lose his wars. What? She was a teenager. I called foul. (And so I wrote the book…)
Fast forward 300 years. Henry VIII’s court is glamorous, the dress sumptuous, the castles heated, the queen has rooms to herself. Visually much has changed from the narrow gowns and great stone halls Isabelle inhabited. Technology has also moved forward with gunpowder, mechanical clocks, eyeglasses, and the printing press. But women’s plight remains. A young girl is banished for marrying without permission and her husband killed. The Boleyn/Howard men push their daughters and nieces onto Henry: Mary Boleyn used and discarded, two cousins, Anne Boleyn and Catherine Howard, married and beheaded. For adultery, although most of the men practice it with impunity.
Women have certainly made advances since the time of Henry, but recent pictures of the all-male White House meeting about women’s health and articles claiming “women” is a forbidden word in applying for research grants (a report the White House has denied), make me wonder.
The book about Isabelle, Behold the Bird in Flight, is available for pre-order here. Thanks for reading.
Looking forward to reading your book!