Graven with Diamonds: Sir Thomas Wyatt and the Inventions of Love Hardcover - 2011

This intriguing and amusing book tells the story of Henry VIII, - his court, his victims and his Queens - from the perspective of a powerful but little-discussed influence in the lives of those involved: poetry. Learned divines despised it, sober heads ignored it, but for Henry, the beau ideal of chivalry, poetry made things happen. It affected his wars, his diplomacy and his many marriages. It was at the root of his fatal attraction to Anne Boleyn, the source of her power and it was the means of her destruction. In this witty and accessible account, Nicola Shulman interweaves the bloody events of Henry's reign with the story of English love poetry and the life of its first master, Henry's most glamorous and enigmatic subject: Sir Thomas Wyatt. Courtier, spy, wit, diplomat, assassin, lover of Anne Boleyn, and favourite both of Henry and his sinister minister Thomas Cromwell, the brilliant Wyatt was admired and envied in equal measure. His love poetry began as an elite and risque entertainment for the group of ambitious men and women at the slippery top of the court. But when the axe began to fall among this group, and Henry's laws made his subjects fall silent in terror, Wyatt's poetic skills became a way to survive. He saw that a love poem was a place where secrets could hide.

Details

• Title Graven with Diamonds: Sir Thomas Wyatt and the Inventions of Love
• Author Nicola Shulman
• Binding Hardcover
• Edition First Edition
• Pages 378
• Volumes 1
• Language ENG
• Publisher Short Books, London
• Date 2011-06-01
• Illustrated Yes
• ISBN 9781906021115 / 1906021112
• Library of Congress subjects Great Britain - History - Henry VIII,, English poetry - Early modern, 1500-1700 -
• Library of Congress Catalog Number 2011431313
• Dewey Decimal Code B