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Aug. 5th, 2011 12:16 pm23/50: Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel. I had heard some discussion of this after it won the Man Booker Prize in 2009. Most of the discussion focused on the author's somewhat unorthodox use of the pronoun "he". It is occasionally confusing, and I don't think it was necessary to draw the reader into the protagonist's perspective, which I gather was the point. But it's also not wildly disruptive. And what people really should be talking about is what a tremendously good book this is.
I love history, and I particularly love British history of the 16th and 17th centuries. I'm a student of politics, and there are few more complex and dynamic political systems than the courts of the Tudor monarchs. And as much as I love A Man For All Seasons, I am not a fan of the real Sir Thomas More and the hagiography (quite literally) that has grown up around that strong, brilliant, but deeply vicious and intolerant man. Wolf Hall presents, among other things, a welcome corrective to the popular image of More, while providing a fascinating portrayal of one of his principal contemporaries. I was drawn in to the story and the character of Cromwell that Mantel presents almost immediately by her terrific, lyrical, intriguing writing, and (Emily will attest) have barely been able to put the book down since I started reading it. She is reported to be at work on a sequel, and I can only say that I look forward to it with an almost mouth-watering pleasure. I have long thought that I would love to write history, or at least historical fiction; if I could write this well, I would quit my job and do nothing else. The research, the detail is painstaking and magnificent, but so is the author's ability to portray complex characters sympathetically and vibrantly without making icons of them. I really can't say enough good things about this book. Read it!
In progress:
The Sultan's Seal by Jenny White
The Williamite Wars in Ireland, 1688-1691 by John Childs
Hostile Skies: A Combat History of the American Air Service in World War I by James J. Hudson
My Name Is Red by Orhan Pamuk
Understanding China by John Bryan Starr
Through a Howling Wilderness: Benedict Arnold's March to Quebec, 1775 by Thomas Desjardins
Out of the Dust by Karen Hesse
Theoretical Criminology by George B. Vold et al.
Drinking Arak Off an Ayatollah's Beard: A Journey Through the Inside-Out Worlds of Iran and Afghanistan by Nicholas Jubber
A Short History of World War I by James L. Stokesbury
I love history, and I particularly love British history of the 16th and 17th centuries. I'm a student of politics, and there are few more complex and dynamic political systems than the courts of the Tudor monarchs. And as much as I love A Man For All Seasons, I am not a fan of the real Sir Thomas More and the hagiography (quite literally) that has grown up around that strong, brilliant, but deeply vicious and intolerant man. Wolf Hall presents, among other things, a welcome corrective to the popular image of More, while providing a fascinating portrayal of one of his principal contemporaries. I was drawn in to the story and the character of Cromwell that Mantel presents almost immediately by her terrific, lyrical, intriguing writing, and (Emily will attest) have barely been able to put the book down since I started reading it. She is reported to be at work on a sequel, and I can only say that I look forward to it with an almost mouth-watering pleasure. I have long thought that I would love to write history, or at least historical fiction; if I could write this well, I would quit my job and do nothing else. The research, the detail is painstaking and magnificent, but so is the author's ability to portray complex characters sympathetically and vibrantly without making icons of them. I really can't say enough good things about this book. Read it!
In progress:
The Sultan's Seal by Jenny White
The Williamite Wars in Ireland, 1688-1691 by John Childs
Hostile Skies: A Combat History of the American Air Service in World War I by James J. Hudson
My Name Is Red by Orhan Pamuk
Understanding China by John Bryan Starr
Through a Howling Wilderness: Benedict Arnold's March to Quebec, 1775 by Thomas Desjardins
Out of the Dust by Karen Hesse
Theoretical Criminology by George B. Vold et al.
Drinking Arak Off an Ayatollah's Beard: A Journey Through the Inside-Out Worlds of Iran and Afghanistan by Nicholas Jubber
A Short History of World War I by James L. Stokesbury
