Ever heard of the Pilgrimage of Grace?
Neither had I – until I read about it in “The Mirror And The Light”, the 900-page novel by Hilary Mantel which is sustaining me during the period of lockdown as a result of the coronaviris crisis.
The so-called Pilgrimage was a northern rebellion against Henry VIII’s government in i536-1537, originally led by Robert Aske and later by Francis Bigod. The rebellion failed and its leaders were eventually executed.
You can check out a five-minute video on the Pilgrimage of Grace here:
April 8th, 2020 at 7:48 am
I hope you’re keeping well, Roger. If you want a full-scale historical novel about the Pilgrimage of Grace and just the Pilgrimage of Grace, you should check out ‘Man on a Donkey’ by H.F.M. Prescott, published in 1952 and regarded at the time as one of the great historical novels. Hilary Mantel has called it ‘a classic of historical fiction [which] captures all the poignant strangeness of the era.’ (I was introduced to it as long ago as secondary school.) It is, I’d warn you though, another 700 pages.
April 8th, 2020 at 7:53 am
As always, I’m impressed with your knowledge, David.
Thanks for the tip but, once I’ve finished “The Mirror And The Light”, I think I’ll be done with Tudor history for a while!