Charlie Fenton > Recent Status Updates

‘While the Royal Family as such would continue to be described as the House of Windsor, those descendants of the Queen who were not designated a royal highness would be Mountbatten-Windsors. It was, she said, when she announced the plan, ‘close to her heart’.’

‘At some point, Gale and Beetee left the wilderness behind and focused on more human impulses. Like compassion. A bomb explodes. Time is allowed for people to rush to the aid of the wounded. Then a second, more powerful bomb kills them as well.’

“President Snow says he’s sending us a message? Well, I have one for him. You can torture us and bomb us and burn our districts to the ground, but do you see that?” One of the cameras follows as I point to the planes burning on the roof of the warehouse across from us... “Fire is catching!” I am shouting now, determined that he will not miss a word. “And if we burn, you burn with us!”

‘Elizabeth was now heir to the throne - but, as a girl, she was ‘Heir Presumptive’, rather than ‘Heir Apparent’. Any late-born brother would supersede her - and her mother was only thirty-six. (She would remain merely Heir Presumptive until the day of her accession, which is why she was never given the title of Princess of Wales.)’

‘Over the preceding weeks, she had been wearing the crown while sitting at her desk, to get used to its great weight. Prince Charles would recall her going in to say goodnight to him with it balanced on her head. She had practised her steps in the ballroom of Buckingham Palace with sheets tied to her shoulders, to simulate the coronation robes with their eighteen-foot train.’

My non-fiction book picked randomly from my jar for August.

‘the desire to prove himself, but there was a small risk that he could be tempted to rebel. By withholding his lands, Henry drastically restricted Thomas’ income and, as a result, his influence and ability to enjoy the lifestyle of an earl. He would be reliant instead on offices, with their attached fees, given to him by the king and the prospect of lands being restored to him in return for his service.‘

‘On tewesday I was sent from newgate to the sygne of the crowne where as mastre Ryche and the Byshopp of London with all their power and flatterynge wordes went aboute to persuade me from God. But I ded not exteme their glosynge pretenses. Then came there to me Nicolas Shaxton, and counselled me to recant as he had done.‘

‘Given the ultimately extensive number of children that he fathered in his lifetime, it is possible that, as well as soldier and courtier, he was also a family man who wished to spend more time with his wife and young child. It is probably no coincidence that Thomas retired from court after his father-in-law’s death in 1475 when Elizabeth inherited the manor at Ashwellthorpe, providing them with a home’

‘It was while she was at Argentan that the devastating news reached Matilda. Stephen, who had twice publicly sworn an oath to support her, had reneged on his word - had perjured himself before God and man - and seized her crown. Her fury may easily be imagined, particularly when coupled with the extreme vexation of knowing that she could do absolutely nothing about it.’

Now that was an awful scene. I know it mentions it in the blurb about the backstreet abortion, but why and what happens after is sickening.

This is reminding me a lot of Call the Midwife and I am really enjoying it

Now this is really interesting, need to look up on this after I finished. I never thought about what life was like for ordinary Germans immediately after World War II and how they were treated by us. Asking a widower if the bombings affected the health of his family, after he lost his wife to that. Interrogating and suspecting everyone.

‘Henry’s immediate reaction to the disaster was not to name another heir straight away; instead he married again with the intention of fathering another legitimate son, and chose as his bride Adeliza of Leuven... she was a young woman in her early child-bearing years who was both beautiful and intelligent, who would make Henry an agreeable companion and hopefully bear him a son as soon as possible.’

‘Essential commodities may have been scarce, but the tried and tested stimulants and suppressants of Empire continued to flow like oil from a deep reservoir. This was no glitch. Gin, as every commissioner, general and governor knew, could bring sophistication to the bleakest of outposts and lift the spirits of Britain’s most downhearted servants. Its manufacture and distribution was a national priority.’

‘Henry I and his queen had only two children, probably ceasing their marital relations after the birth of the all-important son and heir, William, in 1103. As the pair were at this point around thirty-five and twenty-three, and had already produced two children within three years of marriage, it seems unlikely there was any other reason for the lack of further offspring.’

‘Lewis paused. He’d rehearsed this moment several times in his head. Should he appeal to the human element, make them feel sorry, as he had, for the Luberts? Make them see that these were people, like them? Or should he stick with the material facts, namely that this was a house big enough to accommodate twenty people and that it was plain greedy to turf the owners out?’

‘He had survived where many other hadn’t. He was known for his familiarity with the king and perhaps this saved him. Henry knew Bryan would tell him how it was in no uncertain terms and he was clever enough to make sure his loyalty was rarely ever in question. His life had not been plain sailing and there had been close calls but Bryan had adapted to the changes that occurred during his king’s reign’

‘Although Lady Mary had been allowed at court since October the king asked Bryan to help him test his daughter’s virtue. He had heard that Mary knew ‘no foul or unclean speech’ and couldn’t believe she was so innocent. He persuaded Bryan to dance with her at a masque and mention a sexual swear word. As Bryan whispered scandalous words in her ear, Mary paid no attention’

‘Lewis knew that this transaction was illegal - he had both fraternised with Germans and indulged the black market - but he didn’t care: those ten Player’s would buy food from a farmer somewhere. The laws and regulations that the new order had imposed had been concocted in a mood of fear and revenge by men sitting at desks’

‘He was given Norris’ position of chief gentleman of the privy chamber and benefitted from forfeited revenues. In a letter Cromwell wrote to Stephen Gardiner assuring him of £200 out of the £300 pensions paid to Norris and Lord Rochford he commented ‘the third hundred is bestowed of the Vicar of Hell’... This is the first time Bryan is referred to as the Vicar of Hell, a nickname that would stick.’

‘Anne was now firmly in the picture as Bryan well knew. Not yet as a wife for the long but it was becoming plain to all that Henry was enamoured of her. Bryan could not have cared less at the time. As he jousted that day a spear splintered against his visor. He lost his eye but remarkably he survived. He would ever after wear a patch and it was said that because of it he would never let his portrait be painted.’

‘Bryan would later say that he came to Henry’s court ‘very young’. Whether through his mother or his patron, he must have been at court frequently. Soon he was part of a close group of friends that the young king had gathered around him - his ‘minions’ who included Charles Brandon, Thomas Grey, Thomas Knyvett, Henry Guildford and Nicholas Carrew.’

‘“No, the place in your head. I saw it once, a long time ago, a whole country in there, a landscape. You have gone to that place and it is now more real to you than anywhere else. Nothing can keep you from it. Not even the death of your own child. I see this,” she says to him, as he binds her wrists together with one of his hands, reaching down for the bag at his feet with the other.’

‘The sound that comes out of him is choked and smothered, like that of an animal forced to bear a great weight. It is a noise of disbelief, of anguish. Agnes will never forget it. At the end of her life, when her husband has been dead for years, she will still be able to summon its exact pitch and timbre.’

‘Lady Mary Seymour never claimed any remaining part of her father’s estate, and this is the last record we have of her. Her grant from the council was not renewed in September 1550, when it would have fallen due. The assumption must therefore be, in the absence of any further reference, that she was dead by the time of her second birthday.’

‘Still smarting at his relative political insignificance, this half-play, half-serious pursuit of Henry VIII’s younger daughter was an amusing diversion. Her reactions, and the occasional scolding of Katherine Ashley (who was more than a little sweet on him herself) doubtless encouraged him still more.’

‘Neither he nor his wife, as they sit in the room with their tiny babies, knows that this plan will never come off. She will never bring the children to join him in London. He will never buy a house there.’

I always wondered why that was, from what we can tell he seemed to love Anne/Agnes, so why stay away so long? Why not move them to London?

‘She sees the cloud above him grow darker, gather its horrible rank strength... How easy it is, Agnes thinks, as she lifts the plages, to miss the pain and anguish of one person, if that person keeps quiet, if he keeps it all in, like a bottle stoppered too tightly, the pressure inside building and building, until - what?’

‘Katherine herself had nothing directly to say about the events of the summer of 1546. Yet, even if we discount the veracity of Foxe’s verbatim account of how her downfall was planned and averted, Anne Askew’s fate definitely points to a concerted attempt to incriminate some of the ladies who were closest to Katherine.’