The book is quite startlingly inaccurate on dozens of occasions. George VI became king in 1936, not 1937. The famous 1933 Oxford Union motion about not fighting for king and country is significantly misquoted. How Elgar could be regarded as one of the two most successful British composers in the 1930s escapes me: he wrote nothing of any importance after 1919 and was painfully out of fashion by the time he died in 1934. Mrs Thatcher didn’t ‘form a new acquaintance, one Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev’, at Yuri Andropov’s funeral in 1984. She wanted to meet him, but was rebuffed. She first met him on his trip to the UK at the end of the year, three months before he became General Secretary. It wasn’t the ‘leader of East Germany’ who announced the opening of the Berlin Wall in 1989 but an ill-informed Günter Schabowski, by mistake. The novel of Kingsley Amis’s that Thatcher was so dismissive about (‘Huh! Get another crystal ball!’) is not about ‘a communist take-over of Britain’ but a Russian occupation — communism having long been replaced by feudalism. And so on. These astonishingly frequent errors clearly undermine the general authority of the book; but even cleaned up, I think it would fail to convince. And Innovation is an odd title to choose when you have so little interest in technology and scientific breakthroughs. The internet, the discovery of antibiotics, nuclear power and many other things with specific English connections are passed over either in silence or with the briefest possible mention. The Book of Common Prayer effectively set the doctrine and liturgy of the Church of England for the future.

The Stuart dynasty was responsible for bringing together Scotland and England into one realm even if the union has always been marked by political divisions. Opinionated and shrewd, James proved an eloquent king on diverse issues that included abuse of tobacco, witchcraft and theology.He then explores the reign of Elizabeth I which had much stability even if it was plagued by plots against the queen, civil strife and an invasion force. Above all, it is the story of the making of the Anglican Church and the English Reformation. He recounts the foreign wars, the civil strife and warring kings. He also offers a vivid sense of how life was in England from the jokes people told, the houses they built, the food they ate and the clothes they wore. Conservative: A lot of newer research, theories and interpretations are overlooked here or dismissed without ceremony in favour of more conservative and traditional ideas. People like Anne Boleyn, who has been the subject of serious rehabilitation during the last 50 years, is once again reduced to a power hungry flirt. It was sad to read. Now William had no claim to the throne, not even such a weak connection as Henry VII(1457-1509). Henry’s claim to the throne was that his paternal grandfather secretly married the widow of Henry V, Catherine of Valois. What he and Henry VII had in common was that they both took the crown at the point of their sword.

The main focus of the reigns of Henry VIII, Edward VI, Mary and Elizabeth, ignoring the brief interlude of Lady Jane Grey, is centred on the reformation of the English church and the slow demise of the feudal society. These issues are brought to the fore in 'Tudors'. I truly believe that there are certain people to whom or through whom the territory, the place, the past speaks. ... Just as it seems possible to me that a street or dwelling can materially affect the character and behaviour of the people who dwell in them, is it not also possible that within this city (London) and within its culture are patterns of sensibility or patterns of response which have persisted from the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries and perhaps even beyond? [6] It would be difficult to find a more informative and entertaining volume. You are drawn into the barbarity of much of English history and entertained by the more whimsical descriptions of life, particularly in the middle ages. The Mass was said in English, not Latin. An authorised translation of the Bible into English was placed in all churches. For the first time people could understand the words of the religious services and engage with the scriptures themselves.Hawksmoor, winner of both the Whitbread Novel Award [4] and the Guardian Fiction Prize, was inspired by Iain Sinclair's poem "Lud Heat" (1975), which speculated on a mystical power from the positioning of the six churches Nicholas Hawksmoor built. The novel gives Hawksmoor a Satanical motive for the siting of his buildings, and creates a modern namesake, a policeman investigating a series of murders. Chatterton (1987), a similarly layered novel explores plagiarism and forgery and was shortlisted for the Booker Prize. London: The Biography is an extensive and thorough discussion of London through the ages. In 1994 he was interviewed about the London Psychogeographical Association in an article for The Observer, in which he remarked: Who doesn’t love the Tudors? They tie up the dynastic wars of the heirs of Edward Iii in fifteenth century into such a neat little bow. Most of her works usually have something to do with the complex interaction between space and time and what he loves to call the spirit of place. He usually traces the changing nature of London and explores this through its artists and especially the authors.

I've never really 'done' any history - my ideas of the Tudors until recently were Henry VIII = a sort of half-timbered shouting Brian Blessed and Elizabeth I = Miranda Richardson - so I guess I'd probably have liked any book which told their crazy stories fairly competently.

Publication Order of Anthologies

He takes his readers from the construction of Stonehenge to the establishment of cathedrals and common law, which were two of the great glories of medieval England. He takes us to the most distant past of England to a medieval manor house, a Saxon tomb, a Roman fort and a Neolithic stirrup that was discovered in an ancient grave. There is no doubt that he [Henry VIII] had conceived an overpowering passion for her [Anne Boleyn], and she in her turn was doing her best to retain his affection without alienating him." The houses of York and Lancaster were in fact two sides of the same ruling family. The house of Lancaster was descended from the fourth son of Edward III, John of Gaunt, duke of Lancaster; the house of York was descended from the fifth son of the same king, Edmund, duke of York, whose youngest son had married the great-granddaughter of the third son. They are sometimes describes as the third and fourth sons respectively, but this omits one male child who lived for six months. Their closeness, however, bred only enmity and ferocity. Blue blood was often bad blood.

The History of England, v.3 Civil War (also available as Rebellion: The History of England from James I to the Glorious Revolution) It would go on to become a critically acclaimed series which was peculiar as such readers are not known for loving history. For his work early on he got a nomination from the Royal Society of Literature. Well I didn’t really give much more thought to the Plantagenets than any other royal family until my cousin Nancy began researching our family history. It seems my ancestor James Ives (1775-1802) convinced (bamboozled) this rather wealthy girl from a well connected family in Boston to marry him. Her name was Anna Ashley (1782-1822). So far research has not brought to light exactly how James was in a position to marry so well. His livelihood is murky, so he must have been charming or attractive or at the very least a smooth talker. The interesting thing about this marriage is that it insured that at least a thimble-full of Plantagenet blood is circulating in my body.

Publication Order of Ackroyd's Brief Lives Books

Henry VIII began the process of breaking away from Rome for political and dynastic reasons, not because he was swayed by the new teachings of Luther or Calvin. By the end of his reign, the monasteries were destroyed, much of the church lands and treasure confiscated and the monarch was head of the Church in England. Powerful theologians such as Thomas Cranmer worked on standardised forms of liturgy which were to be used in all churches throughout England.