The Other Boleyn Girl
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The Other Boleyn Girl is a historical novel written by British author, Philippa Gregory, based on the life of 16th-century aristocrat, Mary Boleyn. Reviews were mixed; some said it was a brilliantly claustrophobic look at the palace life in Tudor England, others weren't convinced. In 2004 an American reviewer wrote that, “For the most part, the two Boleyn sisters get on like a couple of catty sorority girls. Given the tone of the novel you're half-expecting Anne to light up her cigarette, whip out this month's edition of Vogue and then listen to Mary take the Cosmo sex quiz… Scintillating, provocative historical literature... it ain't!” Even so, it has enjoyed phenomenal success and popularity since its publication in 2002 and has spawned four sequels - The Queen's Fool, The Virgin's Lover, The Constant Princess and The Boleyn Inheritance.
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[edit] Plot summary
The story opens in 1521 when Mary's distant cousin, the Duke of Buckingham, is executed on the king's orders. His crime was daring to suggest that Henry could not produce a healthy son. A year later, Mary's elder sister, Anne returns from the French Court where she has lived as a lady-in-waiting for the last few years. Both the Boleyn girls are remarkable beauties, and Mary (despite being only thirteen years old) is already married to the wealthy courtier, Sir William Carey. Mary's life is turned upside down, however, when the 31-year-old King Henry VIII takes an interest in her. Despite being a favourite lady-in-waiting to his wife, Queen Catherine, Mary yields to her family's pressure and reluctantly becomes the king's mistress. She is assisted in this process by her two siblings - the quick-witted George and the scheming Anne. To her father's delight, Mary falls pregnant with the king's bastard. She gives birth to two children - Catherine and Henry. However, while she is pregnant, Anne sets out to seduce the king and steal him away from her sister. She is successful, and the King flirts with Anne by day and sleeps with Mary by night. In the process he breaks Mary's heart, who has by now fallen in love with him.
By 1527, Henry has made up his mind to divorce his Spanish wife and marry Anne. Mary is pushed into the background and becomes the other Boleyn girl. She is reduced to being Anne's lady-in-waiting. As an act of malice, Anne secretly adopts Mary's son, stealing all legal rights as the child's mother. She becomes consumed by her ambition to be queen, not even bothering to sympathise when Mary's husband dies of the sweating sickness in 1528. Mary comes to suspect that Anne is planning to poison Catherine, and has already attempted to poison a bishop who is opposed to the Boleyns' ambitions.
In 1532 Mary falls in love with a handsome servant, William Stafford, who she secretly marries. A year later, Anne becomes queen. When she discovers Mary has married a commoner, she immediately banishes her from court. Meanwhile, Mary's brother George is trapped in a miserable marriage to Jane Parker and is seeking solace in a secret homosexual affair with Sir Francis Weston. After Anne gives birth to a daughter, Elizabeth in 1533, she suffers two miscarriages - being forced to abort one with a witches' potion. When Mary returns to court in 1535, she begins to suspect that the King is impotent and that Anne and George have committed an incestuous affair in order to help her conceive again. Her fears are seemingly confirmed when Anne has another miscarriage in 1536, and the fetus is monstrously deformed.
The novel now hurtles towards its conclusion. Anne is arrested in May, and so is George. He and his homosexual lover are executed as Anne's supposed lovers, Mary is uncertain what to think - knowing that people are telling lies about her sister, but also fearing that they are telling the truth. In an echo of the novel's beginning chapter, The Other Boleyn Girl ends with an execution - Anne's.
Mary lives out the rest of her life in peace, with her common-born husband, William.
[edit] Allusions/references to actual history, geography and current science
Mary Boleyn was the sister of the more famous Anne Boleyn. As such, she is usually mentioned in the numerous biographies that have been written about Anne, but never in any substantial detail.
Mary, unlike Anne, was the mistress of two kings - François I of France and England's Henry VIII. She was born sometime between 1499 and 1508, probably around 1500. She was considered in her younger days the more attractive of the two, and was the one member of the Boleyn family who ultimately was able to avoid the controversies that led to the executions of both her sister Anne and her brother George.
She was married twice, and died in 1543. Philippa Gregory was intrigued by the story of a queen's sister who apparently has been forgotten by history, but seemed to have been the more interesting of the two sisters. Some of the novel's storyline was loosely based on the work of American historian, Retha M. Warnicke, and the books of British historian, Alison Weir. Others, however, were clear dramatic devices. As a novelist, Gregory also often altered or ignored actual historic events to portray Mary Boleyn in a more positive light, particularly through her portrayal of Mary as a heroine, determined to achieve independance unheard of for an upper-class woman in the mid-sixteenth century.
[edit] Literary significance & criticism
Gregory has a high rate of success with using relatively unknown characters in her historical novels - often, they are not typical historical heroines. In The Queen's Fool, she used the character of Mary I in a sympathetic light, whilst she is usually demonised by admirers of Elizabeth I. The Other Boleyn Girl was unusual not only because it centered on the relatively unknown life of Mary Boleyn; but also because of the sources Gregory listed in her author's note. Some queried if she had overstepped the appropriate limits of a historical novelist and had invited criticism precisely because she listed the sources she had consulted, thus allegedly implying that the novel's storyline was more historically accurate than its critics suggested. Her defenders argue that irrespective of the sources used, Gregory has an artistic license as an author of fiction to construct whatever story she feels is appropriate.
Despite the criticism (see below), the novel has enjoyed high commercial success and it has a large and loyal fan-base. It has appealed to popular interest in the Tudor era, which is currently high in both Britain and America. It has been followed by a sequel called The Queen's Fool, set during the reign of Henry's daughters, Queen Mary and Elizabeth. The Queen's Fool was followed by The Virgin's Lover, set during the early days of Queen Elizabeth's reign. Less successful than The Other Boleyn Girl, The Virgin's Lover once again showed Gregory's refusal to shy away from historical controversy by suggesting Elizabeth ordered the assassination of Mary of Guise and Amy Robsart, the wife of Robert Dudley.
Gregory is also the author of The Constant Princess, a romanticised story of Anne's predecessor, Katherine of Aragon and The Boleyn Inheritance, the tale of Catherine Howard's rise to the throne in 1540.
[edit] Historical accuracy
Some of the inaccuracies in question include the following:
- Mary was almost certainly the elder sister, and the eldest of the Boleyn children.
- Both Mary and Anne were likely older at the time of the novel, Mary having been born in c. 1499 Anne in about 1501.
- Henry Percy's family were Earls of Northumberland, not Dukes.
- Mary's years at the French court were left out of Gregory's novel (only Anne's time in France is mentioned). It is believed among historians that Mary was also, briefly, mistress to the French King, Francis I
- Mary's two children were very likely not fathered by the king, as Henry VIII never acknowledged them. It must be taken into account that the king was eager to prove himself capable of fathering sons and, had he believed Henry Carey was his son, would likely have acknowledged him. The likely dates of Mary's marriage and affair with King Henry, which make it more probable that her children were fathered by her husband, William Carey, are also not observed in Gregory's novel.
There were also general inaccuracies over dates, but this is usual in historical fiction. Mary Boleyn was considered to be fairly promiscuous, and had been sexually active before her first marriage (and was dismissed from service in Paris because of it.) This was changed to suit the novel; Mary was portrayed as a blushing young girl with little to no sexual experience. The Boleyns probably did not encourage Mary's active sex life, and she was probably at least seven years older than the novel suggested. Anne and George Boleyn were both genuinely religious, but this was not mentioned in the novel. Neither was Anne's enormous influence over religious affairs and foreign policy.
However, what provoked the most savage criticism was the presentation of Anne Boleyn. One reviewer was outraged, claiming Anne had been presented as "a scheming trollop," (Guardian newspaper.) There was also some objections from feminist scholars, the vast majority of whom praise Anne Boleyn as a feminist icon. [1] As queen, Anne was also a generous patron of charity and she saved many lives from the Inquisition in Europe. At one point in the novel, there is the allusion that Anne might have committed incest with her brother, in order to become pregnant. This twist in the story provoked the most outcry, one reason being that Anne had sworn upon the damnation of her soul in 1536 that she was absolutely innocent, leading some to feel that it was incredibly disrespectful to distort such a human tragedy in this manner. Interestingly, in one of the novel's sequels - The Boleyn Inheritance - one of the characters admits that she fabricated the evidence used in the trial against the two Boleyns. This implies that the two were innocent all along and it was simply gossip and innuendo which condemned them.
Again, some criticised Gregory because none of the sources Gregory listed in her bibliography supported the theory that Anne was guilty of the charges used at her trial. She had used two biographies of Anne - one by the American historian, Retha Warnicke and another by Marie-Louise Bruce. Both these writers insisted that Anne was innocent, as did books by David Loades, Alison Weir and Lacey Baldwin Smith that Gregory had used when researching the story. Warnicke later publicly distanced herself from Gregory's novel. The defence against such criticism is detailed above.
[edit] Film, TV or theatrical adaptations
[edit] BBC TV adaptation
In 2003, the BBC made a ninety-minute drama based on The Other Boleyn Girl. Much of the novel's sub-plots were left out, including George's homosexuality. Catherine of Aragon's role was much smaller as well, and Thomas Boleyn was presented more favourably. There was a relatively low production budget of £50,000. The drama was shot using modern camera techniques, and much of the script was improvised. Jodhi May played Anne Boleyn and tried to present her in a more favourable light than the novel, but there was still a scene in which Anne begs George to sleep with her. In this production, however, they are encouraged by Mary, which is a considerable change from the book. Only one of Mary's children is fathered by the king, unlike the two in the book.
Natascha McElhone played Mary, Steven MacIntosh played George, Jared Harris played Henry VIII, and Philip Glenister played Stafford. It received mixed reviews.
[edit] Film adaptation
A movie adaptation of the book (with the same title) is due for release in December 2007 (UK Jan 2008) with Scarlett Johansson as Mary Boleyn, Natalie Portman as Anne, Eric Bana as Henry VIII and also starring Rue McClanahan and David Morrissey. The script was written by Peter Morgan, who wrote the screenplay for a well-received television series on Henry VIII in 2003 (starring Ray Winstone, Helena Bonham Carter, Sean Bean and Emily Blunt) and the acclaimed drama The Queen, starring Helen Mirren. A copy of the script has been leaked on the internet and has already garnered a considerable amount of criticism, both from historians and fans of the original novel. Filming was completed in England in late 2006 and the film is currently in the post-production stage.
