Foundation: The History of England Volume I

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Not that it should be overlooked, the point is important enough I won’t discuss that. But it fills 80% of the book, the rest being succession issues and unimportant details. To say it left me wanting is an understatement. Calvin is partly responsible for this sadistic religious crap; Calvin had declared that Christian had a duty to “destroy” false gods. Let’s look at linear progress: under Henry VIII Catholics were burned, while under Elizabeth “some 200 Catholics were strangled or disemboweled.” Vive la difference. Whether your Tudor monarch was a man or woman, looked like Bette Davis or not, you still had to live in fear in a sadistic land. And that violence wasn’t confined to royalty: the stone throwers at executions and that “the people would rather go a bear-baiting than to attend a divine service”. Growing up, his mother was employed in the human resources department of an engineering organization. He never saw his father as he had abandoned the family when he was but a baby. By the time he was five years old, he was reading newspapers and wrote a play inspired by Guy Fawkes by the time he was nine. 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. Easy: This is without a doubt a book written for the masses. It was very well written, easy to follow and not bogged down by descriptions or tangents.

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.Review - A little disappointing in places as there were some glaring errors e.g. Thomas Brandon where it should have been Charles Brandon in the index. What? Nevertheless, a good overview of the period, although not very balanced. A large part of the book was given over to Elizabeth I with very little on Edward and Mary, and not much more on Henry VIII. Henry VII isn't even covered in this book on the Tudors but is covered in the previous one in the series, which seems a little odd to me. I wouldn't really recommend it to serious historians, a few too many little errors. It is probably not easy to write an account of English history that would satisfy both the layman and the expert and that would cover all the aspects and choose the vantage point every potential reader could wish for, and so all I can say is that if you want to read a history focusing on the monarchy and its representatives and adding vignettes of everyday history in between, this is the right book for you. 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. The History of England, v.3 Civil War (also available as Rebellion: The History of England from James I to the Glorious Revolution) This is a very ambitious book, covering the period from prehistory up to the death of Henry VII, and really it would be a good ideas to have some sort of computer programme such as Visio to hand while reading it, because the relationships between the main players becomes confusing. But this is not really a fault. I was prompted to read this book after reading the author's version of the Canterbury Tales, and I'm pleased I did.

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. 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. Elizabeth I to her credit though did not like war; as she said, “My mind was never to invade my neighbors.” The English possession of 211 years on port of Calais is lost. It had cost a fortune to upkeep. Elizabeth I spoke Latin, Italian, French, Spanish, German, and English. She was rarely (if ever) alone. She restored debased coinage to its real value. Mary is forced to abdicate in Scotland and is replaced by James VI. Timber and clay houses are replaced by stone and plaster. Elizabeth I wore the first wristwatch in 1572. The French could be violent douchebags too: “Count Orsini had told the French king that not one Huguenot should be left alive in France.” The Anabaptists are tortured during Elizabeth’s reign for saying Christians shouldn’t be carrying swords. Getting tortured for believing in Christian non-violence. Torture was a royal prerogative in matters of the state. In an exceedingly rare appearance by the real God, on January 12, 1583, the stand of a bear-pit collapses killing many spectators (one hopes the bears dined well that night and the meat wasn’t too tough).This book covers from Stonehenge to the end of the Plantagenet rule with the death of Richard III in 1485 at the Battle of Bosworth Field. I also had a relative that fought on the side of the Tudor usurpers (well how they are referred to in my household anyway) he was knighted on the battlefield by Henry VII for his role in helping to slay Richard. 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.

But there’s no denying that we are becoming increasingly skeptical about these grandly inclusive tours d’horizon. They seem to leave a lot out: the experience of women and the working classes and other outsiders often enter only when the ruling elite decides to offer them education, the vote or previously withheld opportunities. Perhaps these massive narratives will disappear like Debenhams, or go into a long, old-fashioned decline like the Encyclopaedia Britannica. Or perhaps they will change into something new. David Kynaston’s wonderful sequence of books about postwar Britain, the latest volume of which is just out, is rooted not in Acts of Parliament but in individual voices, often quite unknown. Dominic Sandbrook’s highly enjoyable books of the same period are unusually responsive to the fast-changing texture of popular culture and are much more evocative than many narrative histories. The Book of Common Prayer effectively set the doctrine and liturgy of the Church of England for the future. The shifts of religious practice, decreed from the centre, were fiercely resisted. Rebellions broke out. Charges of heresy were levelled by each side against the other; when religion was so tightly tied to politics and power, being declared a heretic could be seen as treason. The punishment for heresy was burning at the stake; that for treason was to be hung, drawn and quartered (no, I’m not going into details), or beheaded if you were an aristocrat.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. 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."