Some of the ruins of Glastonbury Abbey, dissolved in 1539 under Henry VIII. Photo May 1998.
Sunday Short Takes
Not nearly as many things this week, which is good because I’ve already spent too much time today checking links, adding graphics and social links to, and re-organizing the Links Directory section (which is hopefully in a more useful state now than when I started!)
* Historic glass windows go on display in Nonsuch Mansion
* Wolfson History Prizes (for books published in 2012) – Congrats to Susan Brigden for winning for her book Thomas Wyatt: The Heart’s Forest!
* Penry Williams obituary – His book Life in Tudor England was one of the first Tudor history books I ever bought
* A History of Classical Music – A series of posts with embedded Spotify playlists covering the history of classical music, starting with Medieval and Renaissance music. The link goes to the introductory post and they have up through late Renaissance right now. (Apologies to whomever I saw this link from – it was either on Twitter or a blog and I can’t remember now who it was. Sorry!)
Picture of the Week #228
Entry to the Traitors’ Gate, seen from across the Thames. Photo June 2000.
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Sunday Short Takes
Elizabeth and the Three Goddesses. Image:NPG
The big news in the Tudor/Elizabethan art realm this past week was the announcement that the National Portrait Gallery has purchased a portrait of Elizabeth I from a house sale and that it would be included in the gallery’s forthcoming exhibition Elizabeth I & Her People (opening in October).
Here are a few of the articles about the painting from last week:
* Elizabeth I portrait found in house clearance sale – BBC article with a video discussing the painting with the NPG’s Tarnya Cooper
* Elizabeth I portrait to be displayed after being hidden for centuries – From The Telegraph
* National Portrait Gallery buys postcard-sized portrait of Elizabeth I – From The Guardian
Several stories related to Mary Queen of Scots came along last week:
* Mary, Queen of Scots death warrant to go on show – It will be part of an exhibition that I’ll post more about in an upcoming round-up
* Mary, Queen of Scots statue call – If Mary gets a statue, I hope this prompts Pembroke to grant the request for one for Henry VII.
* The CW Picks Up ‘The 100′, ‘Reign, ‘Star Crossed’ & ‘The Tomorrow People’ To Series – “Reign” is the television series based on the teenage years of Mary Queen of Scots in France. I probably won’t watch the whole show, but I might at least tune in for the pilot episode out of curiosity.
Anglotopia has a round-up of British TV coming to PBS in the US this summer, including a show on Hampton Court Palace:
* PBS Reveals Summer Programming of British TV
And finally, I previously linked to the page about the upcoming Tudor Court Season on BBC2, and now they’ve put together a short trailer for it (embedded below):
Picture of the Week #227
The Great Hall (far, closer to the river) and old Norman Hall of Pembroke Castle seen from the Great Keep. Photo May 2003.
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Sunday Short Takes
Lots of things this week!
* Historic milestone for 500-year-old wreck of Mary Rose warship – Scientists have stopped spraying the 500-year-old wreck of the Mary Rose with a protective wax for the first time in nearly two decades, an historic milestone in the conservation of Henry VIII’s Tudor warship.
* My poignant journey in search of the martyrs – Article by Nancy Bilyeau for the Catholic Herald on her research for The Crown and The Chalice
* ‘Evil May Day’: Re-examining the Race Riot of 1517 – Article from the History Today archives
* Lacey Baldwin Smith’s book about Anne Boleyn – Book review from Krya Cornelius Kramer
* Help Fund the World Premiere of The King’s Whore: The Anne Boleyn Story – An Indiegogo campaign to produce a play about Anne Boleyn in New York City.
* TannerRitchie’s Featured Series of the Month for May is the all 38 volumes of Letters and Papers, Foreign and Domestic from the reign of Henry VIII. You can get the whole batch for a lot less than buying each individually. It’s still not cheap, but a great resource!
* English Architecture Lecture – Simon Thurley – A great find by The Tudor Tattler of another informative lecture from the Gresham College series that I’ve linked to before.
* The Children of Henry VIII by John Guy – Podcast from the National Archives
* BBC2′s Tudor Court Season – These are some of the programs that I’ve mentioned in a few previous posts, all gathered together in one convenient place.
And finally…
* Shakespeare and Henry VIII given 21st Century makeover – I’m sure a lot of you have seen this already, but how could I NOT link to it? 
Picture of the Week #226
Stained glass window of Katherine Parr with Henry VIII (right) and Thomas Seymour (left), her third and fourth husbands. Photo May 1998.
I can’t believe it is just a few weeks from the 15th anniversary of my first trip to the UK!
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Upcoming books, exhibitions, and events for May 2013
How can it already be May?
Books
From last month – In Fine Style: The Art of Tudor and Stuart Fashion was released last month in the UK and will be released on May 15 in the US. More about the related exhibition below. And John Guy’s Children of Henry VIII has been moved up in the US and is now due out on May 8 (and actually appears to already been in stock).
The Tudor Rose: Princess Mary Rose, Henry VIII’s Sister by Jennifer Kewley Draskau is due out May 1 in the UK and September 1 in the US:
Anna Whitelock’s Elizabeth’s Bedfellows is due May 23 in the UK. US publication information is unavailable at this time, but I’ll update when I hear more.
And the same with Bosworth: The Birth of the Tudors from Chris Skidmore. I’m really looking forward to this one, so it’s a good thing I have a review copy coming. 
And finally for the books this month, Elizabeth I is finally getting a biography in the Yale English Monarchs series! It will be authored by Simon Adams and is simply titled Elizabeth I: A Biography. It is due out May 28 in both the US and UK.
Exhibitions
As mentioned above with the book news above, the exhibition In Fine Style: The Art of Tudor and Stuart Fashion debuts this month in the The Queen’s Gallery, Buckingham Palace. It opens May 10 and runs through October 6. More information is available at the Royal Collection website, which also includes an online gallery of exhibition highlights and a TEDx talk by the exhibition curator.
Events
* The next Sudeley Castle Tudor Fun Day will be on May 19. Check out the website for more information!
* Marilyn emailed to say that Alison Weir would be speaking at Gainsborough Old Hall on May 11. I went to the website and saw that Ms. Weir had a whole bunch of events scheduled the year, so if you’re interested in seeing her speak check the whole calendar of events!
* Suzannah Lipscomb posted on her blog that she participated in a new BBC2 program on the last days of Anne Boleyn that is scheduled to air in mid-May.
And finally…
I think I’m the last person in the Tudor blog-o-sphere to post about the play Fallen in Love: The Secret Heart of Anne Boleyn, which I have heard excellent things about. The play will be performed at the Tower of London and Gippeswyk Hall, Ipswich at various dates in May and June. More information and links for tickets are available at their website.
Sunday Short Takes
News still seems to be slow right now, but I had a few things to post this week.
* Bess of Hardwick’s Letters – The Complete Correspondence c.1550-1608 – I think this site just came online this past week and is a great resource! In addition to the text of the letters (which can also be downloaded in PDF form), many entries have images of the originals. There is also a background section with essays, tutorials for reading early modern handwriting, podcasts and more.
* Richard III church to be revealed in excavation – The University of Leicester archaeologists plan to return to the site this summer and to uncover more of the church where Richard III was buried.
* BBC History Magazine’s History Weekend – This isn’t until October, but I wanted to go ahead and post about it now before I normally would (late September for the October books and events post) in case it sells out early. Not surprisingly they have put together a great line-up of speakers on many topics (Tudor era included!).
Picture of the Week #225
Chester Cathedral. Photo May 2000.
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Picture of the Week #224
Carvings in the Beauchamp Tower of the Tower of London. Photo June 2000.
If I remember correctly, the oak in the middle is thought to have been carved by Robert Dudley while he and some of his family members were imprisoned in the Tower after the plot to put Jane Grey on the throne.
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The Creation of Anne Boleyn – Review by Kyra Cornelius Kramer
I only had a couple of stories lined up for this week’s Sunday Short Takes, so I decided to save them for next week and post an excerpt of Kyra Cornelius Kramer’s review of Susan Bordo’s The Creation of Anne Boleyn instead. I have a copy on the way for my own review at some point down the road. (And in the interest of full disclosure I’ll add that I was interviewed by Dr. Bordo for the book.)
Dr. Susan Bordo’s new book about Anne Boleyn!
When I found out that Susan Bordo had a book on Anne Boleyn coming out on the 9th of April I did a snoopy dance of happiness. I am an ardent intellectual admirer of Dr. Bordo. As an student in anthropology I read several of her books about the cultural reflections of the body; they are considered to be seminal, paradigm changing texts and she is one of the brightest stars in the Humanities’ sky, so more than one class used her work as a teaching tool. Frankly, I think there is no one better at deconstructing the cultural narratives that are scripted around a subject – especially narratives that are used to reinforce socially ascribed gender differences. In short, Bordo is another intellectual heavyweight who could widen the breach that has been cut through the malarkey surrounding Anne Boleyn’s mythic “bad girl and schemer” persona.
…
Bordo has the intellectual chops and the academic clout to pull no punches when taking apart the misogynistic cocoon that has frequently shrouded the authentic Anne Boleyn, and there was no historian so grand that he or she was safe from the accusation of shenanigans. She called historians out for any assertion about Anne’s life that lacked credible evidence, including G.W. Bernard and his “hunch” that Anne had committed at least some of the adultery she was accused of (p.233). She also frequently illustrated how a historian’s personal interpretation of data was often presented as “fact”, such as David Starkey’s descriptions of Anne as a “ruthless predator” with no actual proof to back up his claims (p.3-6). She also took apart the motives behind Starkey’s irrational, hypocritical, and petulant tirades about “feminized history”, much to my delight (149).
You can read the rest of the review at Kyra’s website.
Kyra Cornelius Kramer is the author of Blood Will Tell – see her previous guest posts here and here for more information on her work.
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Picture of the Week #223
Closer view of the front entrance to the Palace of Holyroodhouse. Photo May 2000.
One last photo of Holyrood (I don’t have many since I only got to see it from a distance) in honor of the 501st birthday of James V, who continued his father’s work on the Palace.
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Sunday Short Takes
Finally, enough stories to do another round-up!
* I posted this on Twitter earlier in the week, but for those of you not on Twitter: Smithsonian Channel gets North American rights to ‘Richard III’ documentary
* Portsmouth’s New Mary Rose Museum to open in May
* Hilary Mantel gives early glimpse of last novel in Thomas Cromwell trilogy
* Lottery funding for Woking Palace history digs – Archaeological digs at Woking Palace, which hosted Tudor monarchs in the 1500s, have been backed by the Heritage Lottery Fund. The moated country manor in Carters Lane was acquired by Henry VII in 1503 and expanded and improved by Henry VIII and Elizabeth I.
* Miniatures: seeing in detail – Neat article on the NPG blog showing magnified photos of some of their Tudor and Jacobean miniatures
Picture of the Week #222
Interior of the Old Palace of Hatfield. Photo May 1998.
This is the other end of the hall from the one I posted back in January 2011.
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Upcoming books, magazines, and events for April 2013
Things are looking quite Tudor-y in April!
Before I get to the books for the month, I have to mention that BBC History Magazine has a Tudor-themed April issue out (cover image above). Be sure to check out the podcast as well – the most recent one features Suzannah Lipscomb discussing Anne Boleyn.
Books
In theory, the ever-elusive Patrick Williams biography of Catherine of Aragon is coming out this month, but I still don’t see it listed on Amazon UK (and the confusing November 2012 date is listed in the US store). I did see it in the spring catalog from Amberley, but I don’t have a firm publication date on it. I’ll update if I find out more information!
First up in the books is the catalog for an upcoming exhibition (which I’ll post more about next month) called In Fine Style: The Art of Tudor and Stuart Fashion. The book us due out in April in the UK and in May in the US.
Next is one I think I’m actually in, since I was interviewed for it – Susan Bordo’s The Creation of Anne Boleyn. It’s due out on April 9 in both the UK and US:
Robert Hutchinson’s work on the Spanish Armada is due out on April 11, also in both the UK and US:
The US store didn’t allow me to do a product link directly to the book for some annoying reason, so here’s my own version.
Next up is another with confusing publication dates, but I’ll go ahead and include it now! Royal Exiles: from Richard the Lionheart to Charles II is listed as out in April in the US and on July 28 in the UK. I’ve included it since I believe it covers Henry VII’s exile in Brittany and France.
And finally…
John Guy’s latest Tudor-era work, The Children of Henry VIII is due out April 25 in the UK and July 1 in the US:
Exhibitions and Events
Just a reminder, The Northern Renaissance: Dürer to Holbein at The Queen’s Gallery at Buckingham Palace closes on April 14.
The BBC History Magazine Talking Tudor event in Bristol on April 28 still has a few tickets left, so grab one now if you haven’t already. They have a great line-up of speakers – I wish I could go!
Sudeley Castle’s monthly Tudor Fun Days are back this year, with the first coming on April 21. More information is available at their website.
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Picture of the Week #221
Choir of Canterbury Cathedral. Photo May 2003.
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Picture of the Week #220
Pepper mill recovered from the wreck of the Mary Rose. Photo June 2000.
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Sunday Short Takes
News has been slow and I’ve been really busy so there haven’t been many posts lately! And I only have two stories to post this week, but I guess that’s better than nothing. And really not relevant to anything, this past Thursday was the 8th anniversary of this blog as a blog (as opposed to the static “news and events” page it was previously). Hard to believe it’s been that long!
* In the April Issue of History Today – The cover story features Derek Wilson writing on Henry VII’s time in exile (a big part of Henry’s life before Bosworth that I find quite interesting)
* V&A shows Henry VIII’s stone leopards – complete with telling tails – Exhibition of royal treasures from various courts includes two mystery beasts with possible link to Anne Boleyn
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Picture of the Week #219
Private home in part of the remaining section of Richmond Palace. Photo May 2000.
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