Hilary Mantel DEAD

[VoR]

Double Booker Prize winning author of the Wolf Hall trilogy among other things. She'd suffered ill health throughout her life so perhaps not a terrible shock but still very sad. I loved the Cromwell books. I also read A Place of Greater Safety which is quite the doorstop but I also remember enjoying.

Wonder if they'll ever bother to make the third book into a BBC series? They just kind of stopped at Anne Boleyn's death, which makes sense I guess, but there's plenty of drama and intrigue to be enjoyed after that too.

 

[jivafox]

Never read any of her books but enjoyed the fuss around her Thatcher fantasy and she seemed like a good egg. That’s sad.

 

[Beverley]

NOOOOOOOOOO!!!!! She was LOVELY!

 

[Peekaboo]

She called Kate Middleton a child-bearing mannequin to the annoyance of ALL THOSE PEOPLE so she was GREAT in my book.

 

[ButterTart]

child-bearing mannequin

Omg

 

[Peekaboo]

For the purpose of accuracy:

Award-winning novelist Hilary Mantel has defended her comments about the Duchess of Cambridge, saying "I have absolutely nothing to apologise for". Mantel had been quoted as saying the duchess was a "shop-window mannequin whose only purpose was to breed"

 

[Sheena]

WHAT A WOMAN!

 

[Sheena]

Oh actually, it's not as revolutionary as it sounds:

Commentary on media portrayal of royalty[edit]​

In a 2013 speech on media and royal women at the British Museum, Mantel commented on Catherine, Princess of Wales, saying that the Princess was forced to present herself publicly as a personality-free "shop window mannequin" whose sole purpose is to deliver an heir to the throne.[40][41][42] Mantel also said, "It may be that the whole phenomenon of monarchy is irrational, but that doesn't mean that when we look at it we should behave like spectators at Bedlam. Cheerful curiosity can easily become cruelty".[41]

 

[GNL]

I've only read shorter pieces here and there (I'm such a non-committal reader) but everything I've read was very good. The hype was very clearly deserved.

 

[VoR]

The Wolf Hall books take a bit of getting used to because her use of tense and perspective is a little... unusual. Also it's a lot of characters to try to keep track of, virtually all of whom seem to be called Richard. But once you get into it they're really very good.