Ohhhh I love Horrible Histories lmao I firmly believe that they captured the true essence of Charles II (and he WOULD LOVE IT)
I used to read the books as a kid. Rotten Romans, Cut-Throat Celts, Awful Egyptians, Terrible Tudors, Vicious Vikings, Measly Middle Ages, Slimy Stuarts, Gorgeous Georgians, Vile Victorians…..
hmmm (and consider that this comes from a jane shore stan first, and a person second):
i wonder how much the narrative (in fiction, even in historic theory) of Richard III definitively, no-questions-about-it murdering the princes in the Tower comes from, like, our need to see ‘karmic retribution’ (in the way he died, in the treatment of his corpse, etc), and the belief that things ultimately happen the way they were supposed to happen & fatalism etc.
Is this not kind of a similar phenomenon to how popular narrative has made Anne Boleyn a cruel, solely self-serving woman, made George Boleyn a rapist…to suggest their deaths were cosmic justice in some sense?
That Mary Boleyn was the one that survived, so she must have been the ‘good one’ (I mean that’s TOBG obvi but it’s not the only work that does it…)
Agnes Strickland characterized Jane Seymour as ‘evil’, to suggest that her death was deserved, in some way.
hmmm (and consider that this comes from a jane shore stan first, and a person second):
i wonder how much the narrative (in fiction, even in historic theory) of Richard III definitively, no-questions-about-it murdering the princes in the Tower comes from, like, our need to see ‘karmic retribution’ (in the way he died, in the treatment of his corpse, etc), and the belief that things ultimately happen the way they were supposed to happen & fatalism etc.
