“It disappoints me that so many people admire Anne Boleyn. She had a good side but also an intolerant and vengeful side which I think is glossed over. She relished keeping Katherine and Mary apart while Katharine was fatally ill. She encouraged her husband to execute those who opposed her marriage such as Sir Thomas More and Cardinal John Fisher. This and much more. Anne didn’t deserve to be executed especially on those bogus charges. She was framed, but this doesn’t make her innocent.” – Submitted by Anonymous
All reports of Anne allegedly “encouraging” Henry VIII to have More and Fisher executed come from sources that are clearly biased against her, some of whom lack credibility due to their flagrantly obvious lies in regards to other topics:
“William Roper, the chancellor’s son in-law, claimed that it was Anne’s personal vendetta against More which encouraged Henry to demand that he conform.”
“It was More’s nephew, William Rastell, religious exile and (briefly) judge of the court of Queen’s Bench, who gave currency… to the lie that Henry VIII was Anne Boleyn’s father. He also alleged – with obvious echoes of Herodias, Salome and Herod – that Anne put on a great banquet for Henry at Hanworth, where she ‘allured there the king with her dalliance and pastime to grant unto her this request, to put the bishop [Fisher] and Sir Thomas More to death’.
In his edition of More’s English works, Rastell even edited out remarks by Sir Thomas which were favourable to the queen. What More had written in a letter to Thomas Cromwell in March 1534 was:
So am I he that among other his Grace’s faithful subjects, his Highness being in possession of his marriage and this noble woman really anointed queen, neither murmur at it nor dispute upon it, nor never did nor will, but without any other manner meddling of the matter among his other faithful subjects, faithfully pray to God for his Grace and hers both long to live and well, and their noble issue too, in such wise as may be to the pleasure of God, honour and surety to themselves, rest, peace, wealth and profit unto this noble realm.”
As for Bishop John Fisher, Anne Boleyn attended his Requiem Mass– this would be an odd thing to do if she’d encouraged his execution.
As for “relishing” keeping Katherine and Mary apart…what evidence proves that was something she solicited, much less enjoyed? Reports from Chapuys would suggest this, but no others do. It was Henry that insisted they be kept apart (although I don’t know if this is something he “relished”); and he was the only person with the power to guarantee they remained so– not Anne.
Also, as for the last, which took me a bit to process:
“She was framed, but this doesn’t make her innocent.”
Well…she was innocent of the crimes she was accused of. In the court of law, and in the court of opinion (especially considering her guilty verdict resulted in her execution); that’s all that matters in determining “innocence”.
Certainly Anne wasn’t innocent in every facet and aspect of her life, if by ‘innocent’ you mean free of fault or sin. She was guilty of anger, of pride, of envy. It would be quite a challenge to find a significant figure in the 16th century that wasn’t.
Unlike many, however, this was something she knew and admitted to:
“I do not say that I have always borne towards the King the humility which I owed him, considering his kindness and the great honour he showed me and the great respect he always paid me; I admit too, that often I have taken it into my head to be jealous of him… But may God be my witness if I have done him any other wrong.”
It is a shame that harsh words Anne spoke about two women she clashed with have overshadowed the ways in which she was a protector of women otherwise. The ways in which she did protect women, among other acts of bravery and kindness, are the reasons I admire her. I don’t find the ways in which she spoke about Katherine of Aragon and Mary admirable, but they don’t eclipse that which is [admirable] about Anne and her life.
Oooooohhhhh @alicehoffmans I was waiting for your response to this!!!
No, I definitely get what you mean, because often her character is made out to be that way– in Tudors we have a scene where she’s telling Mark Smeaton that her “boring husband” has just dropped dead, and how excited she is to now have a one-night stand…while Perdita Weeks’ incredible delivery and scene where she asks Cromwell to intercede with her sister for financial assistance, and quotes a historically accurate letter she sent him was cut from final editing:
But, y’know, obviously the first one was more important.
Keeping the scenes they did– the explicit one with Henry in Season 1, and the one just mentioned, while cutting the one above– about as transparent as Rihanna’s CFDA dress, with none of its class.
Would Mary have been able to make such a good marriage to up-and-coming courtier William Carey if she had a well-known reputation of promiscuity? Frankly, I doubt it; although I suppose it’s not impossible.
It’s assumed she did, also, because she seemed to have a falling-out with her father, Thomas Boleyn. But this could have had many causes.
All we know for certain is that Mary had sex with three men in her lifetime: her first husband, Henry VIII, and her second husband.
So little is known about the second, most famous one, and mostly gaps have been filled with our imaginations. Frankly, all we know is that they hooked up, at least once, in some fashion, at some point. It could have happened before she was married. It could have happened while she was married, but I wouldn’t get all moralistic about it if did– because Henry was, too.
That “the whole court knew” she was his mistress is a fable, because the only reason even we know is the dispensation Henry VIII asked for. That she was his mistress for as long as Bessie Blount was, that she also had at least one illegitimate child with his paternity, is also imaginations filling the gaps– quite simply, there’s not evidence that proves this or even proves this likely.
But I digress. I would say, no, don’t believe the hype of book titles such as “The Boleyn Women: The Tudor Femmes Fatales Who Changed English History”.
Elizabeth Boleyn was not a “femme fatale”– she only had sex with her husband. Mary Boleyn was not a “femme fatale”, as having sex with one’s husband wasn’t especially promiscuous even by 16th century standards. William Carey didn’t die from sex with Mary, he died of the Sweat.
I wouldn’t refer to Mary Boleyn as a “femme fatale” for having sex with Henry VIII– it’s not as if she killed him, either.
Nor would I refer to Anne Boleyn as a femme fatale, as she, like her mother, only ever had sex with the man she married. And the men that were executed along with her in May 1536 didn’t “die because she had seduced them”, while Anne had the last laugh and survived– and that’s the linchpin of the whole femme fatale trope in the first place.
the squad of Evil constantly referring to themselves as “Spartans”, as if they wouldn’t perish if they ever had to complete several consecutive hours of extreme physical activity on military rations, as if they wouldn’t perish if any of them so much as had to wash their own damn clothes…… l m a o.
Hm, I don’t remember the context for it (if she was saying that has been the perception of her ever since, or if she was saying it is a declaration), but I do remember finding her take on Anne rather…anemic…and lackluster.
As far as the wives “as you’ve never seen them before” (iirc the tagline/ hook was something like that), I mean…no? Not really? I definitely didn’t watch it feeling like “I’ve never seen them presented in this way before!” There weren’t really any dimensions added, imo.
