[HN Gopher] Hilary Mantel, Historian
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       Hilary Mantel, Historian
        
       Author : diodorus
       Score  : 17 points
       Date   : 2022-10-16 03:24 UTC (19 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (www.bostonreview.net)
 (TXT) w3m dump (www.bostonreview.net)
        
       | kitd wrote:
       | I finished reading "The Mirror and the Light" just a few weeks
       | ago. The final scenes leading up to Cromwell's execution was some
       | of the best writing I have ever read.
       | 
       | Cromwell was a fascinating person. There can be very few non-
       | leaders who have had such an impact on history.
        
         | telesilla wrote:
         | I felt myself dying, as I read the last chapters of the book -
         | I didn't want it to end, knowing what was to come. As I myself
         | were giving up the ghost, after living with the Cromwells for
         | three books. She was a remarkable writer. I regret I won't read
         | her future unwritten works but am grateful for her completed
         | ones.
        
       | ggm wrote:
       | In a different genre, Dorothy Dunnett might lay claim to the same
       | historiography, she meticulously researched real events and
       | documented behaviours of the time, and wound up recruiting
       | historical figures of often quite minor note, not by any means
       | all princes and masters, for her cast.
       | 
       | I am tempted to say Colleen McCullough too. But I think less so.
       | 
       | Mantel was perhaps unique in the genre of being celebrated for
       | literary qualities much more than historical. I don't think the
       | Booker committee cared if she did the research.
       | 
       | Also, like all good historians, other historians do take downs on
       | her portrayal of Cromwell. They're "standing on the toes" people
       | more than Newton's "standing on the shoulder of giants" (which of
       | course predates Newton and I will deservedly be castigated for
       | naming it thus)
       | 
       | I really liked "a place of greater safety" from 1992 which
       | proceeded the Cromwell books by some years. Spine shivering
       | stuff. The film "Danton" came out some years before in 1983 and I
       | remember thinking that the book influenced how I thought about
       | the times when I saw the film, long after release.
        
         | gerikson wrote:
         | I too can recommend A Place of Greater Safety. Really brings
         | the French Revolution to life.
        
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