Reviews and Comments

I'm unfettered from the source material - disgusted by many characters, disinterested in its many machinations, disenchanted by much of His-Fit in general, but this is my favourite book. It is, in fact, the best book that I have read. All three (in the series) are great, truly splendid, but the second book is the best. It has grip and expedience the other lacked, but never once trades off its great poetry of thought. No, I would not hear a single bad thing about Dame Mantel and her gift of story. The unending, little subtleties of sentiment. The scathing, striking, sublime turns of phrase. Layers in layers of play; nothing given for free, but nothing fully concluded in a way that is unquestionable. Never once does she disrespect the intelligence of her reader. Always graceful. Always balanced. Her Cromwell shall walk with me until I've steps left to take in this world.

Dame Mantel, I mourn that you left so early. I would have liked to write to you about how you changed so much in the way that I am. At least I can say, with surety, the marvel of your work and talent will not simmer down its great ripples for many ages.

It is so very easy to fright a mind from enjoying this work of flightful fiction. A scathing review, pointing out the many inaccuracies against its sources or some (and may you have better days ahead if you watch those, truly) video essay to hammer on the tenses or its style of telling. For the easily influenced, the difference between love and dislike is a whim of opinion. I have, by now, read many reviews telling me why I should abhor this, and I think some make fair points. Still, I liked it. I was moved by the great and bitter satisfaction of the ending, and I liked all passages in which there was simultaneously so very much and nothing at all going on. To all burgeoning classicists, I would recommend Emily Wilson's Iliad and to listen to some of her many talks and lectures. But! I digress. I liked it, with all its little, binary imperfections. We can have it, as a treat. Which it is.

Futures bleak and severe dappled with strange liberations. "I have loved you so much," she said - my far-away favourite character in the book, but that, of course, was by design - and I did cry a little (a lot). I read through it with blazing interest, and short and quickly digestible as it may have been, it is still a taste that will linger for a long while. It's a book that will peek into my thoughts even when I finish other, new ones. Maybe it will never go away? I understand that, in many ways, it is not for me, but I am here for it anyway. I'm here for the art, the endless grey voyage, and the stars up high which (I think) are for everyone. Well, I'm not here to disturb. Just to understand. I like to understand things. She will never tell you what to think. Like poetry, you will have to understand it in a way that will be unique to you. I loved it.