Does anne boleyn's representation in the tudors and wolf hall betray the historical figure ?

Conclusion:

Our objective here was, through the analysis of two television series, The Tudors and Wolf Hall, to see whether the depiction of Anne Boleyn respected or betrayed the Tudor Queen as a historical figure.

To start with, the historiographical study of Anne Boleyn's life led us to understand that, because of the role she played in the Reformation and the accusations made against her, many attempts were made to destroy her memory and erase her from history. These actions had massive consequences because we are now unable to know many details about Anne's appearance for instance. Moreover, Henry VIII's second wife was not only the victim of a desire to make her a «non person», she was also the victim of a propaganda which depicted her as a witch or a heretic. Anne Boleyn's reputation still survived to this day and is deeply rooted in popular culture as, for instance, we can even see her portrait hung at Hogwarts in the first two Harry Potter movies.

The result of these two conclusions is that it is utterly impossible to know who Anne Boleyn truly was, the truth died with her on May 19^th 1536, and when nearly every items linked with her were destroyed. Therefore, how is it possible to portray onscreen with accuracy a historical figure of whom we know very things, apart from gossips and subjective opinions?

Moreover, as we saw it, the objective of fictional portrayals is not to depict the truth about history and historical figures, or give history lessons, but to entertain the audience. To do so, they rely partly on history and historians, but they mostly base their work on their personal view of the period they depict, the type of audience they want to attract and the primary sources they use to portray the characters.

What also have an impact on the depiction of a historical figure in fiction is the point of view chosen to tell the story. The Tudors tell the story of Henry, his wives, mistresses and politics using mostly the King's point of view, Wolf Hall tells more or less the same story but the point of

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view used is Cromwell's, a commoner. Therefore, it is entirely normal that these two series do not depict Anne Boleyn the same way; in The Tudors the focus is put on her intimacy, her inner conflicts and feelings because the series is focused on the royal family, Wolf Hall makes us see the Queen as Thomas Cromwell sees her (at the beginning she appears to be cruel until we are invited to feel pity for her when Thomas does at the end)

Though television series do not aim at teaching history to the viewers, due to this medium's popularity, we noticed that it had a great impact on several aspects linked with history, historical figures and the interest of people for the period depicted in the dramas. Somehow we can consider that period dramas may trigger the interest of curious viewers who wish to go beyond and learn more about the period and the historical figures depicted in fiction through biographies, documentaries, or history books.

Though this work answered the question whether Anne Boleyn's portrayals in The Tudors and Wolf Hall betrayed or not the historical figure, another question was raised. Indeed, it would be interesting to see whether the depiction of the Tudor Queen as a victim undermines the historical figure of Henry VIII who is compared to Bluebeard in popular culture at the expense of his interest in Renaissance humanism, his faith in the Roman Catholic Church before the Reformation, etc...

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