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Catherine of Aragon

Garrett Mattingly, in Catherine of Aragon, aims to create a more complex and significant portrait of Catherine and her life than previously drawn by others:

[I]t was borne in upon me that the Queen Catherine

. . . was a different person, more cultured and thoughtful, more forceful and decisive, than the one I had read about elsewhere. . . . (i).

Catherine has been portrayed as a woman whose significance was measured almost entirely by her relationship with men, with Henry, with the Pope, with the need of others for her to bear a son, or as a rival to Ann Boleyn for Henry's affections. She is often seen as a person who had little to contribute aside from child-bearing, aside from her marriage, aside from her role as symbolic leader.

Mattingly seeks to correct what he sees as these misconceptions about Catherine:

[A]s I followed the history of the Spanish embassy in England, I began to realize that the key to its activities, and to much of what went on in England for a third of a century, lay in the personality and the decisions of this queen. . . . Surely, Catherine's decisions influenced English history--and therefore the history of the whole world--as vitally, and as unexpectedly, as the decisions of her husband, Henry VIII (i).

Even for those who have underestimated the significance of Catherine's impact on history, her life remains fascinating from beginning to end.

The book is organized in three sections: the first is the period from her birth in 1485 to 1509, which the author calls "A Spanish Princess." The second section is "England's Queen," from 1509-1527. The last is "The Divorce of Henry VIII," from 1527 to her death in 1536. The book proper is followed by almost 40 pages of notes and a thorough index. The book includes 8 illustrations.

Mattingly presents a convincing case that Catherine was indeed an active participant in her own life and in the political activities of her time in Englan...

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Catherine of Aragon. (1969, December 31). In LotsofEssays.com. Retrieved 05:58, March 28, 2024, from https://www.lotsofessays.com/viewpaper/1707435.html