The program for the Wolf Hall Weekend will consist of expert talks and lively discussion panels with people who are passionate about The Wolf Hall Trilogy and its award winning literary qualities. Hilary Mantel did not shy away from controversy when it came to challenging commonly held myths about the characters in her novels, and to help attendees explore these topics we are honoured to welcome the following prestigious panel members:
Charlie Courtenay, 19th Earl of Devon
Charlie lives at Powderham Castle, Devon, which has been the Courtenay family home since 1390. In 2015, he succeeded his father to the ancient Earldom of Devon, and later took a seat in the House of Lords as an active and thoroughly modern hereditary peer. Charlie will reflect upon one of his ancient relatives, Henry Courtenay, the 1st Marquess of Exeter (also Earl of Devon), who alongside his eminent wife, Gertrude, played a central role in the court of King Henry VIII, a story retold by Hilary Mantel in The Mirror and the Light.
Melanie V. Taylor BA (Hons), MA, Art historian
Melanie lives in Surrey and is an art historian, author, lecturer, and researcher of visual symbols and allegory in 16th-century portraits. She has extensively studied the lives and works of the officially appointed court artists of the Tudor Court, including Hans Holbein, whose work is currently a major exhibition at the Queen’s Gallery in London.
Melanie will be joining Dr Owen Emmerson on a panel to discuss Cromwell’s Book of Hours in the famous portrait of Holbein and Hilary Mantel’s characterisation of the artist in the Wolf Hall Trilogy.
Bill Hamilton, Hilary Mantel’s Literary Agent
Bill is a literary agent at A.M.Heath and represented Hilary throughout her career. Bill will bring his personal perspective on Hilary’s work to a panel with Robbie Millem of The Times, Lisa Allardice of The Guardian and literary critic Edmund Gordon. Bill once remarked that Hilary could see around corners, beyond facades and right into other people’s minds; she was something of a medium in her unsettling ability to unpick the locks of others.
Rebecca Larson, History Podcaster
Rebecca is the founder of one of the most popular online history podcast sites: https://tudorsdynasty.com and is based in the USA. Since 2015 Rebecca has brought to public attention important events and people from the past, with the help of dozens of highly respected historians and authors. She will be on a panel to discuss the role Hilary’s Wolf Hall Trilogy has played in igniting new and lasting interest in Thomas Cromwell and his critical role in shaping history.
George Miles, Lecturer and Photographer
George created, in collaboration with his brother Ben Miles and Hilary Mantel, The Wolf Hall Picture Book, which is a psychobiography of the life of Thomas Cromwell that combines colour photographs with commentary and extracts from The Wolf Hall Trilogy, some of them previously unpublished. The book reveals a world that is shadowy, frightening, sometimes whimsical – a portrait of a country in conversation with its past. George will be discussing with Ben the process of working closely on this project with Hilary.
Dr Lucie Bea Dutton
A textile artist and scholar, specifically stitching inspired by Hilary Mantel’s Cromwell trilogy. She presented her work at a Huntington Library event in 2021, the archival home of Hilary’s work. Hilary engaged with Lucie about her stitching project and wrote, ‘It means a great deal to me, to have called and be answered. I am in awe of your process. I cannot really sew’. Lucie will be joining a panel discussing adaptations of Hilary’s trilogy, and her stitching will be on display during the weekend. See more about Lucie and her stitching project. https://thethreadofhertale.substack.com/
Simon is a writer and creator of Footnotes and Tangents, an online literary newsletter and book group.
This year, he is hosting Wolf Crawl, a slow read of Hilary Mantel’s Cromwell trilogy with a global community of several thousand readers. In weekly discussion posts, he examines the historical detail and imaginative depth of Mantel’s fiction. And in a special series called The Haunting of Wolf Hall, he creatively explores spectral themes in the Cromwell books.