Hilary Mantel

Stuckfast · September 2022

By strange coincidence I finished reading her Cromwell trilogy last night, and her death was announced today.

If you haven't read Wolf Hall and the other two books, do.

RIP the greatest British writer of the 21st century so far.

axisus · September 2022

I have to admit that she is not someone I've heard of. I looked up Wolf Hall and it sounds intriguing, one to pick up at some point.
Only 70, A shame to go at such a relatively young age.

Some reviewers are pretty useless, of Wolf Hall, Susan Bassnett, in Times Higher Education, wrote, "dreadfully badly written... Mantel just wrote and wrote and wrote. I have yet to meet anyone outside the Booker panel who managed to get to the end of this tedious tome. God forbid there might be a sequel, which I fear is on the horizon."

Yet the book won all these awards!

Winner – 2009 Man Booker Prize. James Naughtie, the chairman of the Booker prize judges, said the decision to give Wolf Hall the award was "based on the sheer bigness of the book. The boldness of its narrative, its scene setting...The extraordinary way that Hilary Mantel has created what one of the judges has said was a contemporary novel, a modern novel, which happens to be set in the 16th century".[16]
Winner – 2009 National Book Critics Circle Award for fiction.
Winner – 2010 Walter Scott Prize for historical fiction.[17]
Winner – 2010 The Morning News Tournament of Books.[18]
Winner – 2010 Audie Award for Literary Fiction for the audiobook narrated by Simon Slater [19]
Winner – 2010 AudioFile magazine Earphone Award for the audiobook narrated by Simon Slater [20]

Nitefly · September 2022

Just read about this on the news:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-63007307

Quite a shock to die at only 70; I sort of expected that she would go on to be a grande dame of the literary world until she was about 103...

Blueingreen · September 2022

Quite a shock. I've read most of her stuff and while I haven't loved all of it - Beyond Black wasn't my cuppa and the final book in the Wolf Hall trilogy was a falling off - Wolf Hall and Bringing Up The Bodies are as good as anything written in the past 20 years. And I say that as someone who's generally a bit resistant to historical fiction.

She always seemed so likeable. She's had pretty serious health problems for most of her life but I'd no idea that she had anything life threatening. 70 is young nowadays.

Stuckfast · September 2022

axisus said:

Some reviewers are pretty useless, of Wolf Hall, Susan Bassnett, in Times Higher Education, wrote, "dreadfully badly written... Mantel just wrote and wrote and wrote. I have yet to meet anyone outside the Booker panel who managed to get to the end of this tedious tome. God forbid there might be a sequel, which I fear is on the horizon."

Blimey. I think that tells you more about Susan Bassnett (whoever she is) than it does about Wolf Hall.

I'd agree with @Blueingreen that the third volume isn't quite as good as the first two, though the very end is incredibly powerful.

The first half of Beyond Black is amazing, it's a shame the second half doesn't live up to it.

JezWynd · September 2022

Sad news. She had a unique style and voice (one that Susan Bassnett was seemingly not attuned to) which bought history to life.

EricTheWeary · September 2022

I must admit I gave up on the television adaptation of Wolf Hall so thought the book would be beyond me. But I know who she was, have heard her interviewed on several occasions and she was obviously a very bright and talented person. RIP.

Fledermaus · September 2022

Her Cromwell trilogy certainly divided people, her writing is like Marmite, try reading the views on Amazon!

I have read Wolf Hall but could not cope with her writing style and so did not read the other two …… and I so wanted to enjoy it…….

As an amateur historian it’s a period of history I have read a lot about, so I am familiar with all the people in the books but still found it confusing…

To each their own though…. RIP

Philly_Q · September 2022

I've never read her books, although I bought nice hardcover editions of the first two for my parents years ago - they probably ended up in a charity shop!

She wasn't very old, I was surprised by the news today. RIP

boogieman · September 2022

EricTheWeary said:

I must admit I gave up on the television adaptation of Wolf Hall so thought the book would be beyond me. But I know who she was, have heard her interviewed on several occasions and she was obviously a very bright and talented person. RIP.

I enjoyed it, although it was mostly Mark Rylance doing his usual laconic delivery and the pace was a little slow. The first two Wolf Hall books are good and worth the read, if a little difficult to get into. I haven’t got round to reading the last one.

70 is definitely young to go these days, I’m only two years short of that myself!

Anyway, RIP.

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