Anne Boleyn: A King's Obsession

by Alison Weir

  I could write another book on how this novel was constructed from the historical sources. Over the course of my years of study, I have seen perceptions of Anne Boleyn change substantially. I am aware that in some circles, particularly on the Internet, she has acquired celebrity status, and that she has become many things to many people and, in the process, controversial. During the writing of this book, an admirer of Anne Boleyn expressed the hope that I would portray her accurately, to which I answered that historians might well differ when considering what “accurately” might mean. There is so much room for conjecture.

  The problem facing any historian or novelist writing about Anne Boleyn is that, in some ways, she is unknowable. We do not have a wealth of her letters, unlike with Katherine of Aragon, whose inner thoughts were often passionately expressed. Much of the material on Anne Boleyn comes from a hostile source, the Imperial ambassador, Eustache Chapuys. Yet recent research on Chapuys shows that he was an observant, well-informed witness, close to the center of affairs, who cited his sources, so we can usually judge how accurate they are likely to have been. This presents those wishing to see Anne Boleyn in a sympathetic light with another problem: how does one get beyond the sometimes damning testimony of Chapuys?

  In writing this novel from Anne’s point of view, I have tried to reconcile conflicting views of her, and to portray her as a flawed but very human heroine, a woman of great ambition, idealism, and courage who found herself in an increasingly frightening situation.

  It has become fashionable to see Anne Boleyn as a feminist heroine, a concept that, until recently, I would have dismissed as anachronistic, arguing that feminism was unknown in Tudor England. That much is true, but in early sixteenth-century Europe, where Anne spent her formative years, there was an intellectual movement and debate that questioned traditional concepts of women and looked forward to an era in which they would enjoy more power and autonomy. This was an age of female rulers and thinkers, and Anne had two shining examples before her: Margaret of Austria and Marguerite of Valois. (Two sources mention her serving Marguerite of Valois, but no dates are given; I have placed her in Marguerite’s household from 1520 to 1522.) I have set Anne in this European context and focused on the cultural influences to which she was exposed. So yes, it is legitimate to see her as a feminist long before her time: it is a concept she would have understood, it underpinned her ambitions and self-image, and it was this Renaissance cultural background, not just the French fashions and manners, that would have made her stand out at the English court.

  Anne spent seven years at the French court, serving Queen Claude, the wife of François I, and Marguerite, but there are no contemporary French sources that mention her. I thought it would be helpful to track, as far as possible, the movements of her mistress, Queen Claude, who imposed an almost conventual rule on her ladies and shunned the court whenever she could, preferring the palaces of Amboise and Blois on the Loire. There is no doubt that Anne would have known these palaces well. But she probably traveled more widely in France too. In 1515, during a campaign to win Milan, François I won the Battle of Marignano. Lingering in Italy, he was introduced to the great artist Leonardo da Vinci, and the following year we find Leonardo installed, at the King’s expense, in a house, Le Clos Lucé, near the chateau of Amboise. Leonardo remained in France and died in that house in 1519.

  Early in 1516, Queen Claude traveled with François’s sister, Marguerite of Valois, and his mother, Louise of Savoy, down to Provence to meet up with the returning hero and accompany his triumphal progress back through France. Anne Boleyn would almost certainly have been with them. It is likely too that she knew—at least by sight—Leonardo da Vinci, for she was often at Amboise, and he had close links to the court. The scenes in this novel are imagined, but they are not improbable.

  Legend links Anne Boleyn with the chateau of Briis-sous-Forges south of Paris. There are all sorts of theories as to how the Donjon Anne Boleyn came to be so named, and I evolved a new one for this book. It proved, however, to be too long, and will be the subject of an e-short to be published separately. Did you pick up the hints in these pages as to what that story might be about? The novel stands alone without it, but in the e-short you can read a slightly different version of that chapter in Anne’s story.

  Apart from a few fictional attendants at the courts of Burgundy and France, the characters in this book all lived. I have kept closely to the historical record, but have taken occasional minor liberties, so as not to slow the flow of the narrative. Given the sometimes awkward syntax of Tudor sources and letters, I have modernized the language in places to make the meaning clearer. Some quotes have been taken out of context or put in the mouths of others, but the sentiments are appropriate for the character or situation. The poetry is all authentic.

  One can only understand the courtships of Anne Boleyn in the context of the game of courtly love, which is explained in the book and is an ongoing theme that dominates the relationships between the male and female characters.

  Seventeen of Henry VIII’s love letters to Anne survive in the Vatican library. Given the couple’s long separations—I was struck afresh by how long they actually were—I am convinced that there must have been more letters, and I have invented or referred to others in this novel. Anne’s replies are lost. If we had them, we would have more insights into her character and her feelings for Henry VIII. In her indictment, it was alleged she had said she had never wished to choose the King in her heart, and while that was an accusation against her, along with other accusations that can be proved false, I think it might have been true. It chimes with what we know of their relationship. It made writing this book from that angle a more seamless task than portraying Anne as being in love with Henry. I think it was all about power on her side. Of course, this is only a theory, and no doubt some will disagree with it, but it was interesting to tell the story from this perspective. It makes it even more poignant.

  To add further poignancy, there is the unacknowledged—until near the end—attraction between Anne and Norris. This was suggested by the wording of her last confession. From her insistence that “she had never offended with her body” against the King, it might be inferred that she had offended in her heart or her thoughts, and that she had secretly loved another but had never gone so far as to consummate that love. The evidence suggests that, of the men accused with her, Norris was the likeliest object of her affections. Again, it’s just a theory, but a compelling one. Norris did confess to something after his arrest—we don’t know what—but later retracted it.

  Sources hostile to Anne mention her sixth fingernail, but it is also mentioned in a laudatory memoir by George Wyatt, grandson of the poet Thomas Wyatt. George Wyatt spent his life researching Anne Boleyn, drawing on his family traditions and the firsthand reminiscences of people who had known her, among them Anne Gainsford. He should be accounted a generally reliable source.

  There is evidence, discussed in my biography Mary Boleyn: The Great and Infamous Whore, that Mary Boleyn was forced to become Henry VIII’s mistress. In that same book, I argued the case for Elizabeth Howard having a poor reputation. Some have inferred, from passages in The Heptameron, her collection of novellas, that Marguerite of Navarre was raped, although others have seen this as a literary conceit. The man, who is not named in the text, was Guillaume Gouffier, Sire de Bonnivet.

  The rivalry between Anne and her sister Mary is implicit in the letter Mary wrote to Thomas Cromwell in 1534. The attitudes toward sodomy expressed in the book reflect the contemporary opinion, for it was then held that sexual intercourse was intended for procreation, and that preventing conception was sinful.

  Studying Henry VIII’s love letters to Anne, it struck me that they fall into three categories: those importuning her to be his mistress in the physical sense, which belong to the initial phase of his courtship; those urging her to be his mistress in the courtly sense; and those in which he is longing to marry her and consummate their relationship, in which he is im
portuning her no more. It has long been asserted, by me in earlier books, and by many others, that Anne held Henry off for seven years, but this reading of the letters strongly suggests that it was Henry who made the decision not to sleep with her lest she become pregnant, which would have caused an embarrassing scandal at a time when he was trumpeting her virtue to the Pope.

  I do not think the wording of the dispensation issued in 1528, specifically allowing Henry, whenever he was free to marry again, to take to wife any woman, “in any degree [of affinity], even the first, ex illicito coito [arising from illicit intercourse],” implies that Henry had already had intercourse with Anne; rather, it refers to his illicit intercourse with Mary Boleyn. There is nothing in Henry’s letters to Anne to suggest that they had briefly become lovers in the fullest sense.

  There is no doubt that Anne Boleyn was an unpopular queen. The state papers contain many libels or slanders. All those mentioned in the novel come from contemporary authentic records.

  The identity of the mistresses Henry VIII took in 1533 and 1534 remains unknown. It’s been conjectured that Elizabeth Carew was the first, and I’ve speculated here that Joan Ashley was the second. She was unmarried, and did serve Anne Boleyn as a maid of honor.

  Much has been made of Anne leaving behind a motherless child of two years and eight months. In fact, Anne saw very little of her daughter, the future Elizabeth I. Elizabeth had her own separate household from the age of three months, and Anne visited infrequently, while Elizabeth was at court only on rare occasions. Tudor queens were not required to be hands-on mothers, although in the novel, we see Anne interesting herself in Elizabeth’s marriage, as was expected of her. We have a record of items of clothing she bought for Elizabeth. Her involvement in her daughter’s life doesn’t amount to much, which suggested to me that, disappointed by Elizabeth’s sex, Anne found it hard to bond with her or love her. In the novel, this only adds to her unhappiness.

  Some readers may wonder at my suggestion that Jasper Tudor built the banqueting hall range at Sudeley Castle, which has traditionally been said to have been the work of Richard III; but while Richard did own the castle, there is no evidence that he ever visited. Jasper Tudor held it from 1486 to his death in 1495, so it’s more likely that he was responsible.

  There is no historical evidence linking George Boleyn to Katherine of Aragon’s death. Readers who are interested in reading more of this tale might enjoy my e-short, The Blackened Heart, which continues a story thread only hinted at in the first novel in this series, Katherine of Aragon: The True Queen. There were rumors of poison after Katherine’s autopsy, the report of which was suppressed. There was a poison attempt on Bishop Fisher (although Richard Rouse was actually a friend of the Bishop’s cook), and the Boleyns were suspected of having been behind it. Anne Boleyn did warn the Bishop not to attend Parliament in case he should suffer a repetition of the sickness the poison had caused. Certainly Katherine’s death was timely, given the need for Anne, who was pregnant, to bear an indisputably legitimate heir. On hearing of Katherine’s death, Anne did weep in her oratory. But the sum of these parts does not amount to good evidence that the Boleyns poisoned Katherine.

  The compromising conversations of Anne Boleyn with Norris, Weston, and Smeaton, and her conversations in the Tower, are based on Sir William Kingston’s detailed reports to Cromwell. Some of these conversations seem disjointed and make little sense in parts, and I suspect that not every utterance was recorded; therefore, using the creative freedom of a novelist, I have tried to make better sense of them.

  The quotation “Orders is orders” is what Sir Edmund Walsingham, Lieutenant of the Tower, famously said to Sir Thomas More.

  Some sources mention Anne’s father being among the peers who condemned her. I have discussed the evidence for this in my book The Lady in the Tower: The Fall of Anne Boleyn.

  George Boleyn’s scaffold speech went way beyond the conventional acknowledgment of sins expected of those about to die, suggesting he was carrying a burden of guilt for some heinous deed(s). I have outlined the evidence for his sexual relationships in The Lady in the Tower.

  I do not subscribe to the view that Henry VIII suffered from impotence during his marriage to Anne, as alleged at George Boleyn’s trial. The fact that Anne became pregnant four times in three years rather counterbalances it. Nor do I subscribe to the popular theory that Henry VIII suddenly changed character after a fall from his horse in January 1536; the source that states he lay without speaking for two hours is an unreliable one.

  Writing the final scenes of Anne’s life was a grueling experience that stayed with me for days, and in case anyone wonders about my portrayal of her actual beheading, I must point out that a judge, Sir John Spelman, who witnessed her execution, recorded seeing “her lips moving and her eyes moving” afterward. There is a discussion about the survival of consciousness after decapitation in The Lady in the Tower. In 1983, a medical study found that “no matter how efficient the method of execution, at least two to three seconds of intense pain cannot be avoided.” Research undertaken in the late nineteenth century suggested that most victims of the guillotine died within two seconds, but a more modern estimate would be an average of thirteen seconds. In 1905, a French doctor observed a decapitated criminal taking twenty-five to thirty seconds to die.

  Severing the spinal cord causes death only when the brain has been completely deprived, through massive hemorrhaging, of the oxygen in the blood that nourishes it. In 1956, two French doctors concluded: “Death is not instantaneous: every element survives decapitation. It is a savage vivisection.” Anne Boleyn did possibly experience a few dreadful moments in which she was aware of what was happening.

  As has been the case before when I’ve written historical novels, telling the fictional version of Anne’s story from her point of view has afforded me new insights into what might have happened. I feel I understand better what shaped her into the person she was, her enmity toward Cardinal Wolsey and Thomas Cromwell, what went wrong in her marriage to Henry VIII, and why she was so unkind to Katherine of Aragon and the Lady Mary. This has made it possible for me to portray her in a more sympathetic light than I could as a historian keeping within the confines of the sources and credible speculation.

  I wish to express huge appreciation of my editors, Susanna Porter at Ballantine and Mari Evans and Flora Rees at Headline, for their inspiring enthusiasm and creative support. Warm and grateful thanks go also to my agent, Julian Alexander, who has been the guiding force, and a tower of strength, throughout my literary career.

  I owe a huge debt of gratitude to Sarah Gristwood, for taking the time to read this novel when she was under great pressure to finish her marvelous book, Game of Queens. I’m indebted to Sarah for generously sharing her research on feminist thought in Renaissance Europe and on the female rulers of the period, and for her creative suggestions. She conjures unique insights and has a huge talent for joined-up thinking, which, coupled with the emotional intelligence that underpins her work, makes for a new and vivid understanding of all the subjects about whom she writes. This book has benefited greatly from that expertise.

  I wish also to express my gratitude to the great, highly professional team at Ballantine who have supported me in the production of this book: Emily Hartley, assistant editor; Melanie DeNardo, my publicist; Maggie Oberrender, for marketing; Victoria Allen, for the beautiful cover design; and Shona McCarthy, the production editor. You’re all stars! Another big thank-you goes to Pete Rendeiro, who suggested the subtitle.

  Lastly, but by no means least, thank you to my wonderful husband, Rankin, who, despite a difficult year of illness, has remained an enormous support and struggled manfully through his recovery to sustain and encourage me in my work.

  To Rankin, my wonderful husband, and Julian, my brilliant literary agent, without whom none of my books would be possible.

  BY ALISON WEIR

  FICTION

  SIX TUDOR QUEENS:

  Anne Boleyn, A King
’s Obsession

  Katherine of Aragon, The True Queen

  The Marriage Game

  A Dangerous Inheritance

  Captive Queen

  The Lady Elizabeth

  Innocent Traitor

  NONFICTION

  The Lost Tudor Princess: The Life of Lady Margaret Douglas

  Elizabeth of York: A Tudor Queen and Her World

  Mary Boleyn: The Mistress of Kings

  The Lady in the Tower: The Fall of Anne Boleyn

  Mistress of the Monarchy: The Life of Katherine Swynford, Duchess of Lancaster

  Queen Isabella: Treachery, Adultery, and Murder in Medieval England

  Mary, Queen of Scots, and the Murder of Lord Darnley

  Henry VIII: The King and His Court

  Eleanor of Aquitaine: A Life

  The Life of Elizabeth I

  The Children of Henry VIII

  The Wars of the Roses

  The Princes in the Tower

  The Six Wives of Henry VIII

  About the Author

  ALISON WEIR is the New York Times bestselling author of the novels Katherine of Aragon, The Marriage Game, A Dangerous Inheritance, Captive Queen, The Lady Elizabeth, and Innocent Traitor, and numerous historical biographies, including The Lost Tudor Princess, Elizabeth of York, Mary Boleyn, The Lady in the Tower, Mistress of the Monarchy, Henry VIII, Eleanor of Aquitaine, The Life of Elizabeth I, and The Six Wives of Henry VIII. She lives in Surrey, England, with her husband.

  alisonweir.org.uk

  alisonweirtours.com

  @AlisonWeirBooks

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