Thank you to everyone who entered the competition. The winners will be announced later this week and look out for Susan’s answers to your questions.
‘The Creation of Anne Boleyn: A New Look at England’s Most Notorious Queen by Susan Bordo was published in the USA last week.
(c) Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
‘Who was the real Anne Boleyn? Part biography, part cultural history, The Creation of Anne Boleyn: A New Look at England’s Most Notorious Queen is a fascinating reconstruction of Anne’s life and an illuminating look at her afterlife in the popular imagination. Why is Anne so compelling? Why has she inspired such extreme reactions? What did she really look like? Was she the flaxen-haired martyr of Romantic paintings or the raven-haired seductress of twenty-first-century portrayals? (Answer: neither.) And perhaps the most provocative questions concern Anne’s death more than her life. How could Henry order the execution of a once beloved wife? Drawing on scholarship and critical analysis, Bordo probes the complexities of one of history’s most infamous relationships.’
Competition
To celebrate, The Lady Jane Grey Reference Guide offers you the chance to win a copy of this fascinating book and to ask the author any burning questions you have about Anne Boleyn, the book, how Anne has been portrayed over the years etc…
Susan will choose some questions to answer and the Q&A will appear at this blog.
Thanks to Houghton Mifflin Harcourt you can win one of five copies in an international give-away!
To enter:
Submit a question to Susan by emailing me at ljgcompetition@yahoo.co.uk.
The competition ends at midnight (UK time) on Friday 19th April.
I will post the questions on this page.
You can submit the same question as someone else as all names will be entered into the draw.
The five winners will be selected at random.
Good luck!
PS. I will be sumbmitting a question but my name will not be going in to the prize draw.
You can follow The Creation of Anne Boleyn on:
Susan Bordo Book @CreationofAnneB
Facebook – The Creation of Anne Boleyn
Questions
From Amelia:
I read a theory, I don’t recall from whom, that Anne Boleyn learned from her sister Mary’s experience as mistress of Francois I and Henry VIII of being briefly used and tossed aside, and so for years Anne held out on Henry to avoid being used and discarded without some sort of substantial reward or benefit. Seeing as how there is little solid evidence for Mary being a mistress of Francois and that she made respectable marriages after her times with the kings, what do you think of this theory? Why do you think Anne held Henry at arm’s length for so long? Personal ambition, familial ambition, self respect, true love?
From Lynette:
Do you think that Anne ever dared hope for, or even expected, a last minute reprieve from her death sentence?
From Lisa P:
What do you think of the Ives biography of Anne and how she is portrayed compared to your own analysis?
From Eliza:
Who do you think was responsible for Anne’s fall? Henry ordered Cromwell to get rid of Anne? Or did Cromwell bring her down because he had interests of his own?
From Sarah:
If Anne Boleyn could offer women of today one piece of advice, what do you think it would be?
From Areti:
Do you think that it’s ‘healthy’ to make Anne our personal role model,and if yes/no why?
From Melissa W:
There’s so much controversy over Anne’s pregnancies. One of her pregnancies is said to have possibly been a false pregnancy because she was said to be pregnant but never showed physically and then it was said she had a miscarriage. Some say Anne lied about the pregnancy to buy herself some time with Henry. Some say that she genuinely thought she was pregnant because she wished it so bad, that she actually had the symptoms of pregnancy. What has your research led to in this regard? Is it possible that Anne was pregnant and lost the baby, or did she fool herself and others into thinking she was pregnant?
From Heather:
As someone that has suffered with infertility and miscarriages, I know that I there were times that I have felt as if I am losing my mind. So, I would like to know how you think these traumatic events/ problems affected Anne’s emotional state, including how Henry’s and the rest of the court’s emotions (and the pressure they placed on her to bear an heir) played into it.
From Elizabeth:
How do you think Anne Boleyn would have viewed how two of the women she disliked in life, Jane Seymour and the then Lady Mary, treated her daugther, Elizabeth after her death? It is believed that both took pity on the motherless child and showed kindness towards her. Do you believe that Anne would have been grateful?
From Rachel:
Do you think that Anne Boleyn would have thrived had she been born in a different time, in particular the modern era?
How did the common people of the time’s views change over the course of Anne’s time as queen? (I always hear very little about the people in the books I have read on the subject)
From Janet:
Some writers suggest that Princess Elizabeth was the daughter of Thomas Wyatt what do you think about this?
From Victoria:
We all know the plot behind Anne was her father and brothers want of power and their greed and how they used both Mary and Anne to get what they want. But what I’d like to know is…. what about Anne’s mother Elizabeth Howard? What were her feelings towards her husband as he was using her child for political gain watching her rise only to see it all end in the death of her 2 children? We hear mostly about her father her brother her uncle….. but barely anything about her mother in these events.
From Lesley:
How do you feel about modern portrayals of Tudor women, i.e., Natalie Dormer’s Anne Boleyn and Maria Doyle Kennedy’s Katherine of Aragon in ‘The Tudors’? Barring some obvious anachronisms that are inevitable in period dramas, are most modern characters more or less true to history?
From Lisa M:
How much do you think was Anne used by her family as opposed to her own ambition when vying to be Queen?
From Kate:
Given the number of books already written on Anne Boleyn, do you think there was pressure on you to write something completely different?
From Wendy:
What is the number one myth as you see it pertaining to Anne?
From Elizabeth:
Do you think Anne was ever in love with Henry?
From Gwynn:
Do you agree with the theory that Anne Boleyn was accused not only of adultery but also of incest with her brother George, as she gave birth to a deformed child as a result of her final pregnancy, & this was Henry VIII’s way of ensuring no-one thought he might be at fault genetically?
From Elinor:
What kind of relation did she have with her daughter? How much did she impact on future Queen Elizabeth?
From Sheila:
I’m writing about Anne for my Masters’ degree and am interested in her friendship with Kat Ashley, nee Champernowne. I wonder if you have any light to shed on Kat and how important she was in Anne’s life?
From Traci:
Of all the women of that era, Anne is by far my biggest hero. I simply cannot read enough about her, or delve deep enough into what made her the way she was. To have her strength and courage in a time when women’s opinions had no influence, she managed to make herself heard. How did she achieve this?
From Amanda:
Did Jane really throw Anne and George ‘under the bus’ giving testimony and such?
From Tish:
If Henry was capable of feeling remorse, do you think Anne’s part in the downfall of Thomas More may have hastened her own demise. Could Henry have regretted the execution of More?
From Susan:
Were Anne’s religious views based on genuine faith/belief or by her or her family’s desire for the marriage with Henry?
From Melissa C:
What do you think Elizabeth I thought of her mother??? And how her execution affected her? How she felt about her father after she learned he had her mother executed? Also I have read a couple of things about Annes execution not going smooth and it took 2 or more hits for her head to come off? I Love Anne she was a strong woman I always want to know what others thought of her she always seemed to be portrayed unfairly and we owe her a lot.
From Liz G:
Do you believe the new theory that the jousting accident Henry VIII suffered on 24 January 1536 caused him brain damage and made him go a bit mad, subsequently affecting his marriage with Anne Boleyn and ultimately leading to her demise?
From Magdalena:
I have been fascinated by the Tudor Era for a few years now and as a teacher myself, I try to instill some of my passion into my teenage students who aren’t too familiar with the British history. Before I even read your book, I wanted to know what made you write about one of Henry’s wives? Who or what made you interested in the topic? And most of all, of all his six wives, why did you choose Anne Boleyn?
From Amy:
Do you think that Anne was really was heartless toward Katherine and Mary as she has been portrayed to be? Could it be that she acted out of fear, knowing that her position was perilous until she produced a male heir?
From Trish:
During your research, did you find information about the Tudor lifestyle that was new to you and that you found yourself changing your current habits/needs/wants? If so, what was the lifestyle change that you made?
From Matt:
How did Thomas Cromwell fit in to Anne’s downfall?
From Ashley:
Do you think Anne feared that Henry would choose to have her burned instead of beheaded?
From Sally:
Anne Boleyn must have been a strong woman to hold off Henry VIII for as long as she did. If she was such a strong personality capable of such manipulation, why is it that history tells us she was very upset about Cardinal Wolsey putting a stop to her relationship and possible marriage to Henry Percy- and sought Wolsey’s downfall? If she was so capable- why did she not stand up for her relationship with Percy? Or did she find her “power” over time? A woman who can hold off a man who did not take “no” lightly, yet she could not fight Wolsey and her own male kinsmen? Was she really that upset, or once the bigger prize came in to play, did she forget all about Percy?
From Tracy:
Is it just popular myth that Anne Boleyn had 6 fingers on her hands, and a large strawberry shaped mole on her neck? Or is that a truth which helped lead to suspicion of her from early on?
From Cindy:
I just finished “Bring Up the Bodies.” How do you feel about the way Anne Boleyn and other women are portrayed in this book and in “Wolf Hall?”
From Rebecca:
Who do you think had the most influence on her in her decisions and choices she made?
From Carol:
Do you think his long drawn out divorce from Katherine of Aargon played a part in Henry seeking Anne’s execution?
From Camille:
Did Anne ever in their marriage love the King? For that matter did she ever truly love anyone? Or did she only see herself has a power player or pawn?
