Hilary Mantel, British author of “Wolf Hall,” “Bring Up the Bodies” and “The Mirror and the Light,” her trilogy based on the life of Thomas Cromwell, died on Thursday at a hospital in Exeter, England. She was 70.
Her death, from a stroke, was confirmed by Bill Hamilton, her longtime literary agent. Mr Hamilton said: “She had a lot of great novels ahead of her, adding that Ms Mantel was working on a novel at the time of her death. “It’s just a huge loss to literature,” he added.
Mrs. Mantel is one of the most decorated novelists in England. She has twice won the Booker Prize, the country’s prestigious literary award, for “Wolf Hall” and “Bring Up the Bodies,” both of which have sold millions of copies. In 2020, she was also shortlisted for the same award for “Mirror and Light”.
Parul Sehgal, former book reviewer for The New York Times, wrote in a 2020 review of “Mirror and Light” that Ms. Mantel’s writing envelops the reader “in a story rich with conquest, intrigue and ambiguous human psychology.” Ms. Sehgal said Ms. Mantel is not only a writer of historical fiction, but also an expert in pointing out “what powers reveal and hide in human character”.
Ms. Mantel was born Hilary Mary Thompson, and grew up in an Irish Catholic family in Hadfield, a village in Derbyshire, England. At the age of 18, she moved to London to study law at the London School of Economics, but could not afford to complete her training. After marrying Gerald McEwen, a geologist, she became a teacher and began to write.
She finished her first novel, “A safer place” But her second book, a contemporary novel published in 1985became a critical success, and in the following decades she developed a large following.
However, Ms. Mantel did not achieve mainstream success until 2009, with “Wolf Hall,” the first in her trilogy of books about Cromwell, the son of a blacksmith who eventually became one of Henry VIII’s most trusted assistants. That novel begins with a shocking scene: A teenager Cromwell lies in a puddle of his own vomit, beaten up by his father. Before long, Cromwell decided to make another life for himself and embarked on a path towards power.
Janet Maslin, in a review for The New York Timescalled “a rich, elegant, detailed biographical novel”.
Maslin added: “The main characters in her book are very well represented. “And their shrewd schemes are presented with relentless force in a book that can compress countless facets into a few carefully curated words.”
In a 2020 interview with The New York TimesMs Mantel said she was attracted to Cromwell after studying in high school about his role in dissolving monasteries in England. When she reads novels about him, however, she finds him presented as a loathsome stereotype. “I realized that some of the imaginative work was due to this man,” she said.
Cromwell became the dominant figure in her trilogy, following him as he morphed into one of the most powerful figures in England, only to then lose the favor of the king and head of the kingdom. me. “I wouldn’t meet another Thomas Cromwell, if you think how long he’s been on my mind,” Ms. Mantel said in the 2020 interview.
Mrs. Mantel not only awakens readers to Cromwell’s life in her novels; She also helped bring him to the stage in a series of award winning games and also a BBC television series.
Ms Mantel is survived by her husband, Mr McEwen, Mr Hamilton said. The couple are childless and a full list of survivors was not immediately available.
Mantel has lived with chronic pain for most of his life. In her 20s, she realized she had endometriosis, a condition where the same problem as the lining of the uterus develops elsewhere. At 27, after a definitive diagnosis, she had to have her uterus and ovaries removed, although that didn’t stop the pain.
Complications from her illness make a normal job impossible, she said in an interview in 2020. “It narrows down my options in life,” she says, “and it narrows them down to writing.”
This is a developing news story.
