The Life of Thomas More by Peter Ackroyd - 480 pages, ⭐⭐⭐⭐☆
I watched A Man for All Seasons (1966; dir. Fred Zinnemann) back in March, and was unexpectedly charmed by the witty dialogue and the intense conviction with which Paul Scofield portrays Thomas More. As the film is a fictionalized adaptation of historical events, I was curious how accurate it is, so I picked up The Life of Thomas More by Peter Ackroyd. Although I enjoyed reading the book, I wouldn't necessarily recommend it for the casually curious.
I got the book in May, and finally finished it a whole seven months later. It's a bit of a brick -- although the copy I read was only 405 pages, with 75 pages of appendices, the book still seemed much longer than it was. That is in no way a condemnation of Peter Ackroyd's writing; his prose is clear and engaging, and he makes a lot of interesting observations and connections (there is an entire chapter comparing Martin Luther and Thomas More, for example, and Ackroyd finds a lot of similarities between the two, despite their very heated disagreement in regards to religion). Ackroyd, however, has a tendency to go into almost superfluous amounts of detail -- I didn't get to where A Man for All Seasons starts until late October. Granted, The Life of Thomas More tells More's entire life story, while A Man for All Seasons focuses only on his final six years or thereabouts. Even so, I thought Ackroyd spent a few too many chapters discussing More's childhood and young adulthood. The high level of detail Ackroyd gives to More's career as a lawyer makes sense, as it informs so much of More's behavior, writing, arguments, and his character as a whole. There are far fewer connections made between More's childhood and adulthood, which makes the length and amount of chapters focusing on More's childhood seem excessive.
The other issue I have with the book, which I hesitate to even call an issue, is Ackroyd's penchant for direct quotes. He frequently quotes primary sources verbatim, complete with untranslated Latin and Early Modern English spellings. One of the final chapters is just the transcript of Thomas More's trial in its entirety, without any commentary whatsoever. While having so many direct quotes from primary sources is nice, it does make the book less readable. I've read my share of Shakespeare and Latin texts, but it was still difficult to constantly switch back and forth between Ackroyd's commentary in present-day English and the primary sources in Latin and Early Modern English. It might be a good idea to keep Wiktionary handy to help translate the Latin, or the Google Translate app if you just want a rough translation quickly.
Despite my complaints, I did find the book interesting enough to finish. I particularly liked how balanced Ackroyd's perspective on More is. He discusses More's surprisingly-progressive views on the importance of education for women, as well as his clever satire in Utopia and his other writings. He talks about More's love for bawdy jokes, and the many probably-apocryphal stories of his witty remarks to defendants at trial. Most of all, though, Ackroyd portrays More as a person who was deeply frightened by the changing world around him, so much so that he was willing to give up his life for what he believed. In short, Ackroyd writes about More the man rather than More the martyr. He picks apart the stories and rumors that have been passed down through generations of biographers, and notes whether there is any evidence of truth behind the legend. While I do see some of the real Thomas More in Paul Scofield's portrayal from A Man for All Seasons, his More is a bit too heroic, too perfect. Ackroyd emphasizes that, despite More's cleverness and celebrated conscience, he was still just a flawed human being like the rest of us.
You could say The Life of Thomas More is a book for all seasons, considering how long it took me to finish it. I realize I keep harping on that, but I want to emphasize that this is not a book most people would pick up for a casual read. It's a bit of a slog, really, but it's a fascinating slog. Hardcore fans of Tudor history, people with a lot of time on their hands and a solid working knowledge of Latin and Early Modern English, and incredibly-persistent people who want to know everything about Thomas More for some reason may want to give it a try. For everyone else, though, the Wikipedia page and/or A Man for All Seasons would probably suffice.
