Bring Up The Bodies

Published in 2012, Bring Up The Bodies is a historical fiction novel by Hilary Mantel. The second book in Mantel's Thomas Cromwell trilogy, it's based on the true events of Henry the VIII, King of England, as he tries to divorce his wife, Anne Boleyn (which was illegal at the time), in order to marry Jane Seymour. The author of several novels, Mantel has won many awards for her works, including the Man Booker Prize, the Costa Book Award, and the Hawthornden Prize. She currently resides with her husband in England.

The story begins shortly after the conclusion of the first book in the trilogy, Wolf Hall. Thomas Cromwell, the son of working class parents and a lawyer by trade, has risen to the rank of Master Secretary to the King's Privy Council through his many political allies. He is the King's right-hand man, but that's not all--the King also thinks of him rather as a brother figure.

The story opens with animal imagery: Thomas' hawks (whom he named after his deceased daughters) diving down from the sky onto their prey. Thomas, the book's intelligent and observant narrator, is staying with the King at Wolf Hall, the manor of the Seymour family, during the summer and autumn to avoid the diseases that spring up in London during the warmer months. Although the King previously tried for seven years to marry Anne Boleyn, his second wife (he received an annulment from his marriage to his first wife, Catherine of Aragon), now he is unhappy. Anne has yet to produce a male heir, but even beyond that, the King finds her to be argumentative and tiresome. The sharp wit and independent spirit that initially attracted him to her have become her downfall in his eyes.



When the King is seriously injured in a jousting accident, it is thought he will not survive. Because he lacks a male heir, relations and noblemen rush in to claim the throne, and civil war looms. Anne, who is currently pregnant, hears the news of the King's accident (coincidentally on the day of the funeral of his first wife, Catherine) and goes into shock, miscarrying a male child. Though the King survives, Anne's miscarriage is more or less the final straw. He wants a divorce. Because divorce is prohibited by the Church, the King risks any future heirs being named illegitimate (and thus, unable to succeed him on the throne) if he cannot find a way to legally separate from Anne and marry Jane. Thomas pledges to find a solution for him.

Thomas' first plan is to approach Anne's father, the Earl of Wiltshire, and brother, Lord Rochford, and negotiate for a voluntary separation on Anne's part. While the Earl is willing to bargain, Lord Rochford opposes the scheme wholeheartedly.  He tells Thomas, "I will make short work of you."

Despite the fact that Anne is one of his earliest political allies (he helped her become queen, and she helped him gain favor in the King's eyes), Thomas hatches a new plan to bring her down by destroying her reputation. His mentor, Cardinal Thomas Wolsey, was previously brought to ruin in a similar fashion. Anne's confidants, impatient for her to take the throne, had skewered the Cardinal's reputation over his failure to successfully negotiate with the Pope over the annulment of the King's first marriage.



Over the course of three weeks, Thomas begins questioning the people closest to Anne, including her sister-in-law, Lady Rochford, and collects rumors of her supposed infidelity to the King. Anne, however, proves quite a match for Thomas' schemes. He says, "One thing she set out to do, this side of salvation: get Henry and keep him." Flirtatious, proud Anne refuses to lose her husband to the plain, submissive Jane. So where his rumor collecting falls short, Thomas uses spies, bribes, and even torture to ensure that the proof he needs is found.

Eventually, he collects enough evidence (though he privately acknowledges that some of it is false) that he is able to have Anne arrested on capital charges of cheating on the King with seven different men, one of whom is her brother. She is found guilty of treason and executed, along with her brother and several other confidants. Before her death, however, her final words sing the praises of the King in a last-ditch effort to appease him. The effort fails.

For his part, Thomas receives a barony, as well as the satisfaction of having avenged his mentor. The title, Bring Up The Bodies, refers both to the disposal of the remains of the executed from the Tower of London and to the "ghosts" that haunt Thomas from his past: his wife and daughters, Cardinal Wolsey, etc.



Jane wins "the poisoned ring" of marriage to the King, and the couple is able to focus on producing a male heir while Thomas steps in to handle several affairs of state, including diplomacy with France and the Holy Roman Empire. He says that there are no endings, only beginnings. Similar to how the novel began, it ends with animal imagery: a fox attacking a hen house.