Since the king destroyed his patron Wolsey, Cromwell has survived and prospered through an alliance with Henry’s second queen, Anne Boleyn. There is a kind of freedom in it but he is aware that it is up to him to invent himself, day by day, never off his guard, never less than ingenious and bold and three moves ahead of the pack of courtiers around Henry. He is conscious of what an oddity he is: one the most powerful men in England, but with nothing behind him, no ‘breeding,’ no pride of ancestry, no inherited values: also, you might say, no constraining code. And the trip through the west of England has allowed him to take a survey, in his mind’s eye, of the region’s aristocratic families and how they think and live. A steady stream of messengers go to and from London, keeping the government running. On the other hand, Henry is easily influenced by the people close to him it would be useful to have more friends in the inner circle of the court.Ĭromwell is not entirely at leisure. Thomas Cromwell is teaching his apprentices to have regard for the substance of power, rather than its appearance. The Cromwell party has to endure a steady stream of put-downs from the young gentlemen around the king, Francis Weston in particular: but they are used to that. Cromwell, his secretary, is indispensable to him.

Thomas Cromwell is a member of the party, with his teenage son Gregory and his young lieutenant, Rafe Sadler, the steady shrewd young man who has grown up in his household, and whom he is grooming for high office. The king, with a small hunting party which does not include Anne the queen, is at Wolf Hall in Wiltshire, the home of the Seymour family. But Henry seems to have forgotten the dead man, as he plunges into the pleasures of the hunting season.īring Up The Bodies opens in September 1535. More’s fate is a dreadful lesson to anyone who stands in Henry’s way once, he and the king had been confidantes and friends. Though it looks like a victory, More’s death is a kind of defeat for Cromwell ‘victory’ would have been persuading him to live, and knuckle under. Thomas More, who opposed the king, is dead, his head spiked on London Bridge, his prayer book examined for bloodspots and then disposed of. Wolf Hall left Thomas Cromwell in July 1535, the court about to quit London for the summer. Before you say, “him or me?” you should have the axe in your hand.’ ‘Before you say, “Him or me?” you should have his name on a warrant and the ports blocked, his wife in your confidence, his friends bought, his heir under your protection, his money in your strong room and his dog answering your whistle. You don’t stop, at a point of crisis, to consider the merits of your opponent’s case, or weigh his interests against your own. ‘Him or me?’ is not a question, Thomas Cromwell says – it is a directive, it is a call to action.

Author of bring up the bodies