"Only dull people are brilliant at breakfast"
-Oscar Wilde		 Brilliant at Breakfast title banner "The liberal soul shall be made fat, and he that watereth, shall be watered also himself."
-- Proverbs 11:25
"...you have a choice: be a fighting liberal or sit quietly. I know what I am, what are you?" -- Steve Gilliard, 1964 - 2007

"For straight up monster-stomping goodness, nothing makes smoke shoot out my ears like Brilliant@Breakfast" -- Tata

"...the best bleacher bum since Pete Axthelm" -- Randy K.

"I came here to chew bubblegum and kick ass. And I'm all out of bubblegum." -- "Rowdy" Roddy Piper (1954-2015), They Live
Wednesday, May 21, 2008

Anne Boleyn, The Tudors, and Women who Plan to Sulk if Hillary isn't Nominated
Posted by Jill | 6:43 AM
Well, it doesn't look so good for Anne Boleyn, now, does it.

I don't know what it is about the short-lived Tudor dynasty so compelling. After all, Henry VIII wasn't the only European king who fooled around with women to whom he wasn't married. Queen Victoria's son Albert, who became King Edward VI, had an extended affair with Lillie Langtry, after all. It's tempting to think that the story of Henry VIII and his wives is about the sex -- especially when the series currently running on Showtime is populated with so many relentlessly gorgeous people and more flesh than we've seen in any other treatment of this story. But there's so much packed into this particular piece of history -- the Reformation, Henry's break with Rome, the tragedies of the various women unfortunate enough to catch his eye and his interest, the relentless stream of pride goingeth before a fall. But one of the most compelling aspects of this story has always been Henry's moral relativism in the face of the intense religiosity that characterized the age in which he lived, and how that moral relativism led him to the heinous acts that books and movies and television have retold over and over and over again.

For all the fine dramatizations that have been done in the past depicting this story, and for all that this one plays so ridiculously fast and loose with certain historical details, there's a kind of raw immediacy that this series has. Once you suspend disbelief enough to buy that a slightly-built young man with cheekbones you could grate cheese on, impossibly perfect teeth and an Elvisish curl of the lip is the large, hearty king we know from the Hans Holbein portraits, and if you can avoid ticking off the many historical liberties taken in this series in the name of narrative, there's a palpable intensity here that sucks you into the emotional lives of these people.

In last Sunday's episode, we saw quite graphically the miscarriage that was literally the final nail in the coffin of Anne Boleyn's marriage to Henry. Anne has always been portrayed as this strong, defiant creature that has often made it difficult to find her sympathetic. We forget how she was pimped out by her family to curry favor with the king and expected to somehow hold onto his interest when her own sister had failed to do so. Imagine what it must have been like for an intelligent young woman to try to balance the headiness of attracting the attention and gifts of a king, one's obligation to one's family, and at the same time be witness to your own sister's plight as a discarded mistress. Imagine watching your male fetuses bleed out of you knowing that you only have so many tries to produce a male heir. We've always seen Anne Boleyn as a schemer, fully complicit in her own fate, a homewrecker who on some level we always felt got what she deserved. Natalie Dormer's interpretation of the character is just as self-assured as those that have preceded hers, but she finds the human part of Anne that we've so often missed:





Life for women in Tudor England just have been horrible:

Young girls were given hardly any personal freedom.

Religion was at the very center of life in Tudor England. And girls were raised to obey their parents without question.

Girls were taught their only function in life was to marry and bear children.

They learned they were commanded by God to render unquestioning obedience to their husband and to learn in silence from him in all subjection, the same way they behaved at home to their parents.

[snip]

Most people in the first half of the 16th century didn't believe in education for women. They held the medieval belief that teaching girls to read and write would cause them to waste their time and skills on love letters.

[snip]

Husbands of upper class girls were chosen for them by their fathers or other male relatives. Very few men and women of noble birth chose their own partners.

Marriages were arranged for political reasons, to cement alliances, for riches, land, or status, and to forge bonds between two families. The idea of marrying for love was considered bizarre and foolish.

Royal marriages were contracted largely for political, military, or trade advantages. It sometimes happened that the couple never saw each other until the day of their wedding.

[snip]

A girl's chances of marriage depended more on the wealth and social position of her family than on her beauty or accomplishments (though a comely appearance and a pleasing demeanor never hurt).

The Pre contract would contain a clause calling out the terms of the bride's Dower Rights; the amount settled by her husband or father for her living expenses in case of widowhood.

Even if she was widowed, she didn't gain and keep control of those funds unless she didn't return to her father's house or remarry.

[snip]

The Tudor concept of marriage fit into what they believed was the divine order. God ruled the universe, the King ruled the country, and a husband ruled his family.

Like subjects to a King, wives were bound in obedience to their husbands and masters.

Men expected to rule their wives and thereby gain their love and reverence. They believed a man could make, shape and form the woman to his will. They thought a loving, virtuous, and obedient wife was a gift from God.

For the woman, even queens, that meant total subjection to and domination by her husband, who was often a domestic tyrant.

Marriage was a period of upheaval and adjustment for any woman. Even more so for a Queen. Often she had to face a dangerous journey to a new land and a stranger, leaving her home, family, and native land never to see them again.

Royal wives could come to enjoy considerable power and influence as did both Katherine of Aragon and Anne Boleyn. But all such power emanated from her husband. She had no authority or freedoms except those he allowed her. Without him she was nothing.

Queen consorts were housewives on a grand scale with nominal charge of vast households and many estates which produced huge revenues.

They had a battalion of officials to administer the estates for them. The Queen only controlled the income allowed to her by the King. No major transactions of any kind could even be considered without his consent.

As a matter of fact, any decisions made, from financial matters to domestic issues, were subject to his approval. Usually the Queen had a privy council appointed by the King to oversee and advise him about her affairs.

The chief duty of the Queen was to produce heirs for the succession. She was also to set a high moral tone for the court and kingdom by being the model wife, full of dignity and virtue.

[snip]

The chief function of Queens and of wives of lesser status as well, was to produce sons to ensure continuation of her husband's dynasty.

Pregnancy was usually an annual event.

Many women and babies died in the childbed. Pregnancy and birth were extremely hazardous.

The expectant mother not only prepared a layette and the nursery for her new baby, but also made arrangements for someone to care for her child if she died during childbirth.

Even if she did survive the birth she could be physically scarred for life.

There was such a lack of medical knowledge even doctors, who were usually only called in if there were complications, had no real idea of how to treat or even diagnose.

Couple that with their almost total lack of understanding of even basic hygiene, and you begin to see why so many women died.


Anne Boleyn got caught up in power games played by men, was a pawn in her own family's ambition, succumbed to the headiness of being able to get a king to make her a queen, and then failed to remember what her function was.

Today we are once again hearing the rumblings of religious fundamentalism. That fundamentalism has worked its way into our government, where the judicial branch of government is one retirement away from the addition of another Samuel Alito to the Court. This breed of justice believes that because the word "privacy" is not seen in the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution, there is no right to privacy. There are people in this country who would return women to their place in Tudor England -- whose role is solely that of wife, mother, breeder. They would not only make abortion a crime, but they would also turn back the clock and overturn Griswold v. Connecticut, thereby allowing states to outlaw contraception the way some states outlaw sex toys today.

While some so-called feminists have obsessed about how Hillary Clinton has been treated by the media, and whether Barack Obama has been condescending, and have been threatening to stay home or vote for John McCain in November, they're forgetting how much of the progress women have made in the last four decades is because they are no longer slaves to reproduction. I have no doubt that Anne Boleyn wanted to have a male child as much as Henry did, and her inability to do so -- perhaps caused by Henry VIII having syphilis, as one theory has it -- cost her her life. Not so long ago, NOT wanting a child one had conceived could cost a woman her life.

A John McCain presidency means an end to the reproductive freedom we've all come to take for granted. I'm hearing women say that we should allow McCain to be president so Hillary can come back triumphant in 2012. John Paul Stevens is not likely to stay on the Court another four years. 2012 is too late. The march of the Court and of this country's attitude towards women cannot afford anothe four years of a Republican president in service to the descendants of those in the early 16th century who accused intelligent women of witchcraft, and behaded women on trumped-up adultery charges because their own Y chromosomes were too weak to turn a human egg into a healthy male child, and treated women as possessions and pawns in their power games and who twisted religion and their God to justify the most heinous of crimes against humanity.

These women claim to want their daughters to live in a world where nothing is off limits to them. We've come so far since Anne Boleyn lost her head because she didn't produce a male heir. Yes, there's more progress to be had. But the road we've been on for my entire adult life comes to an end with more conservative Supreme Court justices -- justices who will rule against pay equity and the right to self-determination. So if you're a Hillary Clinton supporter who is tempted to stay home just because you believe that a woman "deserves" the chance this year, just think about what you'll have to tell your daughters about how you helped the retrogressive aims of the Christofascist Zombie Brigade make sure that the world you envisioned and hoped for never comes to pass.

Labels: , ,

4 comments
Bookmark and Share
4 Comments:
Anonymous Anonymous said...
Great post Brill. The role of the president in appointing judges has largely been overlooked in election coverage. The damage that could be done (not least to women's reproductive rights) by appointing another "Torture is constitutional" judge would worry me if I was a US citizen.

Here in the UK our parliament held firm last night and smacked down a Christian Fundy challenge to our abortion laws. Many of us are worried that in our next election the balance of power will shift so much that the next attempt will succeed and we'll have to stick Union Jack flag pins on every woman's uterus.
5/21/08, 8:32 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...
Jill,

Far too many people in this country don't recognize "their own best interests". They certainly don't vote for them! At least the "majority" that voted for 'W' in 2004; the 'bitter' working class, blue collar Americans who seem to prefer Hillary [or McCain] and who would rather see their jobs go offshore instead of voting for "a black Muslim".
Says a lot about the American education system. Not sure exactly what, but none of it is good!

I'm male and concerned far more about Social Securty's security than I am about 'reproductive rights', so in order to unclutter the mind [great earlier post, BTW! Our databases are just too full!] I've basically decided that if we truly believe in 'democracy' then we have to allow the people to make their own very bad decisions. And I have to put a LOT more money into my 401K and other investments. Unfortunately, their decisions will have a very bad impact on ME. But I've come to the conclusion that they don't care..

"Can you pass me the remote please!"
5/21/08, 9:59 AM  
Blogger Batocchio said...
Reproductive freedom is one of many reasons it's important to defeat McCain and the GOP in November, and one of many reasons that blather about 'both parties being the same' is ridiculous.

Regarding Henry VIII, PBS had a good Six Wives of Henry VIII series. Anne Boleyn was quite crafty, but she was playing the hand she was dealt as an upperclass woman at the time, and was certainly treated abysmally by Henry. Throw in A Man for All Seasons and Sir Thomas More while you're at it. Henry was quite the ass. But we still have authoritarians who love the idea of a monarchy (or the Unitary Executive Theory), and the social control you're describing. The standard in many royal courts I've read of was a political marriage with affairs on the side, but it was easier for men than women on that front. And women often had it very lousy, indeed. The best possible situation for a woman was to be a rich widow.

Regarding the Tudors, I find it's interesting to study the Brits and the "Tudor myth." I don't know if you've ever read The Daughter of Time or The Sonne in Splendor, and I haven't yet read any of Sandra Worth's pieces on the House of York. I recently read Richard III with a group. It's a fun play and Richard is a great part, but Shakespeare based his play on the Tudor version of history on the War of Roses, so Richard is hunchbacked, deformed, etc. even though that's bunkum. The Tudors' reasons for demonizing Richard and the Yorkists, and depicting Henry VII's ascension as divine will and a restoration of the natural order (given his shaky claim to the throne) are pretty clear. What I find interesting is how that take has endured so strongly. My theory is that the Brits so love Elizabeth, understandably — and they loooooove her — that there's some need to validate her whole family tree, as well. And then there's 3000 books on Mary, Queen of Scots, and her diehard adherents! It can get a little crazy at times.

But coming back to women and that general period — Cecily Neville, Duchess of York, "the Rose of Raby," mother to Edward IV and Richard III, is quite an interesting figure. She was pregnant 12 twelve times, and saw 7 children to adulthood. Sadly, that was better odds than many in that era. The rates of miscarriage, death during pregnancy and death at a young age were really pretty dire, and must have colored life to an extraordinary degree. In Cecily's case, as one site points out, "All but one of her twelve children predeceased her." History can be very romanticized, and we can forget or just not know how many families would lose at least one child, and how horrendous living conditions were, particularly for women. I'm a fan of PBS' history reality series (Manor House, etc.) and the series Worst Jobs in History because they put things in perspective. Or as Howard Zinn has put it on occasion, "What good old days?"
5/21/08, 1:53 PM  
Blogger Jill said...
PBS had TWO series on the six wives of Henry VIII. I've always been partial to the 1970 version with Keith Michell, because it shows Henry both young and old. Ray Winstone in the one from a few years ago plays him as pretty much disgusting all the way through. And Helena Bonham Carter as Anne Boleyn? Puh-leez. Actually, Dorothy Tutin from the 1970 series is the one who LOOKS most like Anne Boleyn, except that she seemed too old.

The thing in the US about royalty goes beyond the whole unitary executive concept; it's this love of dynasties we have. I guess we can blame Jackie Kennedy and her talk of Camelot if we want to, though kudos for the boomer generation of Kennedys to largely try their hand at politics and either quit (Kathleen) or keep a low profile as a legislator (Patrick). Joe III quit because of his divorce, and JFK Jr., who might have been the Next Big Kennedy Star, of course met his untimely end. But for the most part, this bunch, and their children, are involved in philanthropy or activism or the arts and seem to have inherited none of Old Joe's lust for a dynastic residence at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue -- unlike the Bush family, which DOES seem to be lusting for a permanent Bush dynasty (if Georgie hasn't blown it for all eternity...I happen to think that we'll hear rumblings from George P. in 2016). And that's another reason why I never supported Hillary -- enough with the dynasties already. People died to get rid of a monarchy in this country, why do we want to rush into another one in which families rule by accident of birth?
5/21/08, 2:11 PM  
Post a Comment
<< Home