Beware the pregnant 12-year-old
By accident rather than design, I watched the Bosworth episode of The White Queen on the 528th anniversary of the battle. I can't remember anyone ever mentioning they were at Bosworth, but then the geography always seemed odd. A few weeks ago, Anne announced that she and Richard were going to live in Warwick, mysteriously shunning their childhood home in Middleham. Perhaps it was so that they could nip down to London more easily, as everyone seemed to be able to get from anywhere to anywhere else very quickly (particularly if they were Margaret Beaufort homing in on a battlefield).
Anyway, the Ricardians should be relieved, as Richard turned out to be one of the very few people in England not attempting to kill his nephews. I was not entirely clear how many of them survived; definitely the younger one, who presumably turned into Perkin Warbeck so his survival was only temporary. But though we saw soldiers arriving at the room in the Tower, we didn't see actual killing so I was half-expecting to be told that no under-age princes had died in the making of this production. Apart from Edward of Middleham, obviously.
One thing that struck me early on was that both this and the Saturday night drama, Top of the Lake, turned on the pregnancy of a 12-year-old. Top of the Lake, incidentally, had a happier ending than I expected, but one was left with the impression that being a woman in 15th-century aristocratic England was marginally better than being a woman in 21st-century rural New Zealand. Apart from childbirth; TWQ did manage to convey the ghastliness of Isabel's miscarriage on a ship crossing the Channel, particularly when Anne was asked to try to save the child because she had the smallest hands. But this brings me back to the pregnant 12-year-old.
She was less obvious in TWQ, because they chose to start the story several years later, with the first meeting of Elizabeth Woodville and Edward IV. But when Philippa Gregory, who wrote the novels on which the drama was based, made an accompanying documentary called The Real White Queen (I suspected she really wanted to call it I do know what was happening in the late 15th century, honest, read the novels), she went straight to the point. No messing around with Woodvilles and Nevilles, this is about Margaret Beaufort's Tudor husband impregnating his 12-year-old bride who then nearly died giving birth. (Gregory's view was that, though child marriage was not unusual for girls of Beaufort's rank, it was considered a bit off to consummate before the girls appeared strong enough to survive childbirth. Apart from anything else, waiting improved the chances of a live heir.)
The odd thing was that the dramatisation portrayed Margaret Beaufort as completely bonkers without ever explaining that she had a perfectly good reason to be bonkers. It was alluded to in the scene with her dying mother, when she said "You sent a child to do a woman's job." The near-fatal birth of Henry Tudor was clearly in Margaret's mind when she was shown holding the bloody newborn Richard of York. But you had to know her backstory already to understand those scenes. And meanwhile Margaret Beaufort ploughs on, trying to persuade everyone around her to risk their lives doing completely barmy things because it's the will of God that her son should be king, and every time they listen to her it ends in disaster. The unfortunate death of her half-brother is particularly disastrous, and as far as I can make out entirely fictional.
Her first good move is marrying Thomas Stanley, and that was her aide's idea. ("I can't marry him, he's a traitor." "If you look more closely, ma'am, I think you'll find he's a cynical opportunist." "Oh well that's all right, then.") And thank heaven for that, as Stanley's cynical and extremely cheerful opportunism kept the show going after the departures of Warwick and Jacquetta. I still think they'd have done better to write the whole thing as a sitcom called The Lions, the Witch and the Warlord in which rival claimants to the English throne and the hand of one of their respective daughters are auditioned by Jacquetta and Warwick, week by week.
I did enjoy Margaret's big wobble at the battle, which she insists on attending, when she decides it's all been a horrible mistake and her son is going to die in a field because of her husband's irrational preference for saving the life of his own son, a hostage with Richard, despite her explaining that said husband's son will be remembered as a hero who bravely offered up his life to do God's will and crown a step-brother he's never met. Sadly, Richard runs out of troops - he never had very many, and all TWQ battles seem to be shot in woods in an attempt to make this less obvious - and Stanley rather mysteriously makes this out despite the view being blocked by trees so intervenes on Henry's side after all, and Margaret concludes she was right all along.
Also posted on Dreamwidth, with
comments.
Anyway, the Ricardians should be relieved, as Richard turned out to be one of the very few people in England not attempting to kill his nephews. I was not entirely clear how many of them survived; definitely the younger one, who presumably turned into Perkin Warbeck so his survival was only temporary. But though we saw soldiers arriving at the room in the Tower, we didn't see actual killing so I was half-expecting to be told that no under-age princes had died in the making of this production. Apart from Edward of Middleham, obviously.
One thing that struck me early on was that both this and the Saturday night drama, Top of the Lake, turned on the pregnancy of a 12-year-old. Top of the Lake, incidentally, had a happier ending than I expected, but one was left with the impression that being a woman in 15th-century aristocratic England was marginally better than being a woman in 21st-century rural New Zealand. Apart from childbirth; TWQ did manage to convey the ghastliness of Isabel's miscarriage on a ship crossing the Channel, particularly when Anne was asked to try to save the child because she had the smallest hands. But this brings me back to the pregnant 12-year-old.
She was less obvious in TWQ, because they chose to start the story several years later, with the first meeting of Elizabeth Woodville and Edward IV. But when Philippa Gregory, who wrote the novels on which the drama was based, made an accompanying documentary called The Real White Queen (I suspected she really wanted to call it I do know what was happening in the late 15th century, honest, read the novels), she went straight to the point. No messing around with Woodvilles and Nevilles, this is about Margaret Beaufort's Tudor husband impregnating his 12-year-old bride who then nearly died giving birth. (Gregory's view was that, though child marriage was not unusual for girls of Beaufort's rank, it was considered a bit off to consummate before the girls appeared strong enough to survive childbirth. Apart from anything else, waiting improved the chances of a live heir.)
The odd thing was that the dramatisation portrayed Margaret Beaufort as completely bonkers without ever explaining that she had a perfectly good reason to be bonkers. It was alluded to in the scene with her dying mother, when she said "You sent a child to do a woman's job." The near-fatal birth of Henry Tudor was clearly in Margaret's mind when she was shown holding the bloody newborn Richard of York. But you had to know her backstory already to understand those scenes. And meanwhile Margaret Beaufort ploughs on, trying to persuade everyone around her to risk their lives doing completely barmy things because it's the will of God that her son should be king, and every time they listen to her it ends in disaster. The unfortunate death of her half-brother is particularly disastrous, and as far as I can make out entirely fictional.
Her first good move is marrying Thomas Stanley, and that was her aide's idea. ("I can't marry him, he's a traitor." "If you look more closely, ma'am, I think you'll find he's a cynical opportunist." "Oh well that's all right, then.") And thank heaven for that, as Stanley's cynical and extremely cheerful opportunism kept the show going after the departures of Warwick and Jacquetta. I still think they'd have done better to write the whole thing as a sitcom called The Lions, the Witch and the Warlord in which rival claimants to the English throne and the hand of one of their respective daughters are auditioned by Jacquetta and Warwick, week by week.
I did enjoy Margaret's big wobble at the battle, which she insists on attending, when she decides it's all been a horrible mistake and her son is going to die in a field because of her husband's irrational preference for saving the life of his own son, a hostage with Richard, despite her explaining that said husband's son will be remembered as a hero who bravely offered up his life to do God's will and crown a step-brother he's never met. Sadly, Richard runs out of troops - he never had very many, and all TWQ battles seem to be shot in woods in an attempt to make this less obvious - and Stanley rather mysteriously makes this out despite the view being blocked by trees so intervenes on Henry's side after all, and Margaret concludes she was right all along.
Also posted on Dreamwidth, with
comments.