The Lady in the Tower by Alison Weir
Posted By Claire on October 7, 2009
It’s here! The long awaited book by Alison Weir has been released in the UK and is being devoured by Anne Boleyn fans and Tudor history buffs.
Weir’s publisher, Jonathan Cape, has been publicising this book as the first book to be entirely devoted to Anne Boleyn’s fall; a little misleading when books like Retha Warnicke’s “The Rise and Fall of Anne Boleyn” and Eric Ives’ “The Life and Death of Anne Boleyn” cover Anne Boleyn’s fall and the events leading up to it in detail, but it is technically true!
I blogged last week on The Anne Boleyn Files about my thoughts on the first few chapters of “The Lady in the Tower” and what had struck me so far:-
- Weir’s belief that Anne and Henry’s marriage was unhappy from the start
- Weir describes Anne as “haughty, overbearing, shrewish and volatile”, perhaps due to hormonal imbalances caused by pregnancies and miscarriages - Harsh words!
- Weir’s belief that Anne was not chaste and virtuous and that Henry became disenchanted or disillusioned when he realised this.
- Weir’s ideas about Anne’s appearance - Weir writes about Anne’s sixth fingernail and her moles which could have been seen as marks of the devil.
- The idea that Anne was Rhesus negative - not a new idea as it was put forward by Retha Warnicke, but it’s interesting that Weir is also discussing it.
- Anne’s malice towards Mary
- Chapuys - Weir does imply that although his letters are great primary sources Henry VIII’s secretary wrote of Chapuys’ “Tale-telling, lying and flattering”. Chapuys often relied rather too heavily on gossip.
- Jane Seymour - Hallelujah! Alison Weir also believes that Jane Seymour may not have been the meek, demure, “sugar and spice and all things nice” woman that she is often portrayed as.
- Henry’s accident - Did Henry’s accident make him think of his mortality and bring home to him the urgency of getting a male heir?
Those are just a few points or issues that struck me when I was reading the first few chapters and Alison Weir does not disappoint in the rest of the book. I was forever underlining bits, putting stars by paragraphs and making notes, and that is always a sign that I am finding new ideas and theories, or things that back up my own beliefs. Question marks or exclamation marks in margins mean I am not impressed and these were rare in Weir’s book.
I wouldn’t say that there was anything truly groundbreaking or revolutionary in Weir’s examination of Anne Boleyn’s fall, but there were times when I almost said “Ah” out loud when she explained something that I had never fully understood before or when she backed up a theory that others have put forward but never proven with evidence. My poor husband had to listen to me read bits out when I got overexcited!
What is a delight about this book is the detail that Weir gives about:-
- The events leading up to Anne’s fall
- The fall or “coup” itself
- The men involved
- The trials
- Anne’s imprisonment
- The executions of the men
- Anne’s execution
- The burials
- Public reaction to the news of Anne’s execution, both home and abroad
- Elizabeth
- The legacy of Anne’s execution
- The changing views surrounding Anne’s story
- Anne Boleyn legends
Everything was covered and every question or niggling doubt that I had seemed to be answered in this book and it will definitely be the book that I use alongside my beloved Eric Ives book, which is getting rather battered. I don’t want to spoil the book by giving a rundown of Alison Weir’s thoughts and theories, but highlights of the book for me were:-
- Weir’s examination of Henry’s role in Anne’s fall - Did he order the investigation? Was he determined to get rid of Anne at all costs or was he too an innocent victim who was made to believe the worse of Anne?
- Weir’s accounts of the trials - How they were organised, who was on the jury, what happened and what evidence there was against the men and Anne.
- The detail that Weir gives about the men - Too often we forget that Anne was not the only victim, five men were also executed and they were more than just names, they were real people with jobs and families. Weir explains who they were, how they got embroiled in the coup and examines whether they really were the “libertines” and homosexuals of Warnicke’s book.
- Weir’s description of Anne’s execution and her look at the various accounts of it and the speech that Anne made.
- Weir’s examination of the evidence that brought Anne down and how, if Anne was innocent, 95 jurors could find her guilty
I also love Weir’s words on page 322 and 323:-
“Notwithstanding all this [that some believed the evidence], it is almost certain that there was a grievous miscarriage of justice. The circumstances of Anne’s fall strongly suggest that she was framed; even her enemy Chapuys thought so.”
and
“In weighing up the evidence for and against her, the historian cannot but concluded that Anne Boleyn was the victim of a dreadful miscarriage of justice: and not only Anne and the men accused with her, but also the King himself, the Boleyn faction and -saddest of all - Elizabeth, who was to bear the scars of it all her life. In the absence of any real proof of Anne’s guilt, and with her having been convicted only on suspicious evidence, there must be a very strong presumption that she went to her death and innocent woman.”
Many people still believe that Anne Boleyn was a whore who deserved everything she got so I hope that this book will go some way to restoring Anne’s image, we can but hope.
All in all, I would wholeheartedly recommend this book to anyone interested in Anne Boleyn and Henry VIII, and would say that it is a must-read for Anne Boleyn fans and students doing essays or projects on Anne. Read it!
“The Lady in the Tower” by Alison Weir is published by Jonathan Cape and is available now in the UK. Click here to purchase from Amazon UK who ship worldwide.
I am getting this for my birthday soon, and it has just had the most daming review by “The Sunday Times”. It was by some historian, of whom I have never heard and he crowed over the fact that Alison Weir hadn’t seen a particular document in the library at Oxford which contradicted the last third of her book. It’s spoilt the book for me and I don’t think it was a review but a spiteful piece of self-publicity! Grr!
I keep being put off books by reviews on Amazon so am trying not to read them now! Was it John Guy who wrote the review that you read? If so, he is a Tudor historian and author who has written books on Tudor England, Mary Queen of Scots and Thomas More. I haven’t actually read his books so can’t comment but I hate it when historians take potshots at other historians because it always reads like they’re trying to discredit them and raise their own reputation. I really enjoyed Weir’s book and loved the fact that she gives so much information about the events leading up to Anne’s fall and also all of the people involved, who are often ignored.
http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/books/non-fiction/article6894033.ece
Sorry, I can’t hyperlink it. Yes, you are right, it was John Guy! I hate that sort of thing too. I love Alison Weir and have emailed her a few times, last time to tell her that Amazon.co were originally touting her book as a “children’s” book! She was not happy! I did History at the original Canterbury campus of UKC (they’ve since got four more, one in Brussels!) and loved it. another friend did hers at Oxford and hated it because all her lectures were full of sniping remarks about other historians. Oxford may be very prestigious, but my friend said she envied me.
I’ve just posted here
http://misadventuresofmoppet.wordpress.com/2009/11/18/how-alison-weir-was-duped/
about the John Guy review of Lady in the Tower and more generally about pitfalls for historians!
I did my history degree at Oxford and had a very positive experience. Since then I have found that the academic world can be at best a very supportive community, at worst very egotistical and bitchy.
Having read John Guy’s review again and looked at Alison Weir’s book, I do think he has a point and it isn’t just historians sniping at one another. As Miss Moppet points out in her article on her site, the world of historical evidence is a minefield and it is easy to quote sources that aren’t as solid as they may seem. I wonder if Weir has replied to Guy’s review at all.
Guy’s review isn’t the bitchiest I’ve read by any means. The academic world relies to an enormous extent on networking and exchange of information and an awful lot of errors get picked up in books before publication this way. Popular historians like Weir are less well off in this respect because they’re not affiliated to a university or institution, so it can be harder for them to build up a network of contacts.
I would just like to say that I did read this, and enjoyed it, but I do not believe for one moment that Anne would have had the chance to to do what Francis I st suggested. Queen Claude’s court was a by-word for chastity and good works, and privacy was not really known about until the 18th century - everybody, whether in a palce, great house or a cottage, lived cheek to cheek.
I greatly enjoyed Alison Weir’s new book but must point out that she has made some debatable asserstions about Anne in earlier books- most notably in her Henry VIII- King and Court where she asserts on very flimsy evidence that Anne was pregnant when she was executed. She no longer thinks this was the case - it is ironic that in her new book she refutes the pregnancy theory and in a footnote admits she herself was the person who gave it traction. Davis Starkey in Six Wives is scathing about her grounds for the pregnancy claim and Weir acknowledges his comments in her footnote.
I have recently read this book and it is just amazing! Rather embarrasingly, i must admit that this was the very first historical non-fiction i have read (I’m not as old as I may seem!), but still, there is nothing too heavy for me if it’s about Anne Boleyn! She was an amazing woman and I think that Weir does her justic in her book - and also all those others implicated in her downfall.
I just finished reading this excellent book, and thought I would leave a few thoughts.
Firstly, I felt that while Weir obviously believes that Anne was 100% framed, she tries to present any evidence to the contrary (of which there is precious little!).
Secondly, I read John Guy’s review, and just cannot agree with it. One thing that struck me upon reading it was his statement that we just don’t know exactly what happened. Also that his wife is a historian (or something similar). Since he is correct about not knowing EXACTLY what happened, his criticism seems somewhat disingenuous. After all, what can a historian but do but look at all the facts they can, and then present their opinion? We will NEVER know EXACTLY what happened.
Thirdly, while I wholeheartedly agree that Anne was framed, I don’t completely agree with everything Weir said. For example, I believe Henry had more of a hand in it than she does.
Therefore, IN MY OPINION (for what it’s worth LOL!), I think this is an excellent, well-researched, fascinating look at Anne’s final days. Fascinating! I literally couldn’t put it down, and like Claire, I was constantly reading parts aloud to my husband - I’m sure he was bored, but he knows my fascination with the whole subject!