Customer Reviews

Good King Harry (Ballantine Reader's Circle)

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Although historical fiction has always been very popular, I don't
believe that this kind of fiction--recreating a real human being's
life--has ever come into vogue as much as it has in the last
twenty-five years or so. Just in the last year I have read several of
them, including Margaret George and Nigel Tranter, and I'm sure
there are dozens more that I don't even know about. Even Ronald
Reagan's life has been fictionalized, and he hasn't even had the
good grace to pass on yet!

Normally, a writer of historical
fiction will research a particular period of time, create their own
characters, put them in place, and let them go. This personalized
kind of thing--putting a voice to a known historical figure--seems to
me to be a much more difficult task. First of all, you have to stick
to the known facts. As much as you think you know, there is always
going to be somebody out there who knows more than you, and who will
gleefully hammer you if you get something wrong. Secondly, you have
to be bold enough to use your imagination when there are gaps, and at
the same time to do so in such a way that these suppositions fit in
with things which are known. For example, Henry was known to frequent
what were considered to be lower-type establishments in his youth. It
is unlikely that he smoked opium, or engaged in homosexual conduct, to
give just a couple of bizarre examples of the way history is often
distorted. Lastly, while conforming to these strictures, you have to
do the normal things that fiction writers do; you know, like creating
character, and sustaining a compelling narrative.

Ms. Giardina has
chosen to complicate matters for herself further by fictionalizing the
life of no less a personage than Henry V, who must rank very high on
the list of well-known English monarchs. A lot of people know about
him. Oh, and one other thing: Henry V has already been done. What
was the name of that guy? The playwright?

Indeed, this is what
this book appeared to be after the first 100 pages or so: a
novelization of the great Shakespeare plays: Richard II, Henry IV part
I and II, and HenryV. But no. It is so much more than this.
Clearly, Ms. Giardina did her own research, probably utilizing many of
the sources used by the great one. It is her own project completely,
from her recreation of historical events, to her imagination of
fictional situations, and to the motivations of her characters. And
she makes them all come delightfully alive.

The plot itself is
more than you could want for intrigue and adventure. It starts with
Henry, (his nickname is Harry) as a boy. He is held hostage by
Richard, and expects to die when his father, Henry Bolingbroke, usurps
the crown. As prince he serves under his father, who despises him,
and spends years in an effort to subdue a rebellion in Wales. He
finds a girl there, starving and alone in an empty hut with her dead
mother. She will become his only true love. As a young man, and
under the care of his father's lieutenant, he discovers a plot
against his father, and escapes in the middle of the night on
horseback. He earns glory by being made a captain in his father's
army and defeating these enemies at Shrewsberry, only to learn later
that his promotion was made by those who expected and hoped he would
be killed. Eventually, his own father plots against him, the
archbishop plots against him, and other supposed allies plot against
him. And then there are those who favor the legitimate heir! Even
after he becomes king, the intrigue doesn't end. Uneasy lies the
head which wears the crown!

But that's the historical stuff. As
to the made-up stuff, most of which occurs during Henry's early
life, Giardina succeeds as well. She wisely avoids the temptation to
recreate Shakespeare's bumpkins and clowns. No Falstaff will you
find here, and smart for her not to try. But her own creations are no
less compelling, and equally believable. Henry falls in love here,
meets true friends here, and learns duplicity here. He forms a bond
with the commoners which serves him later on, making him the kind of
king he becomes.

Shakespeare's Henry is a great nationalist,
appealing to the glory of England. Other versions paint him as a
megalomaniac, arrogant, and angry that the French don't give him
his due. Giardina's Henry is motivated by wanting to do good. He
recognizes the suffering of the peasants, and feels it is his duty to
make life more bearable for them. This is his motivation for the
French invasion. France, torn by civil war, was being ripped to
pieces by raping and pillaging bands of soldiers. Henry, having
brought peace to Wales through benevolent leadership, feels it is his
duty to bring his vision across the sea. He tries, and despite great
hardship and primarily through the force of his own will, he achieves
his greatest success at Agincourt.

But victory is often elusive, and
Giardini gives us no easy answers. Henry is a conflicted, sensitive
man, and constantly doubts himself. He recognizes that both his
actions and inactions result in the death of innocents. He despairs
when he sees that the small good he accomplishes is so easily
undone.

This is a terrific book. If you are looking for adventure,
it is here. If you are looking for a solidly researched history, it
is here. If you are looking for fine literature, it is here.
Ms. Giardina should be commended. This is historical fiction at its
best.

Good King Harry was Giardina's debut novel but I didn't read it until after I had finished, and fallen in love with, her outstanding second historical novel, Storming Heaven and its sequel, The Unquiet Earth. I'd read that she'd made Henry V the subject of her first novel because she didn't think anyone wanted to read about hillbilly coal miners. I could understand that, but what really puzzled me is what a daughter of the Appalachian coalfields would find so interesting about British royalty.

I borrowed Good King Harry from the public library mainly out of curiousity and by the end of the first page, realized that this too was one I needed to acquire for my collection.

The answer to my question was of course, that Henry V was the beloved King of the commoners - Good King Harry. As with Giardina's other works, her talent for bringing history to life and her ear for language are flawless.

I whipped through this book and really enjoyed it. I have not seen many books that give us an idea of what Henry V was like as a child, a lovr, a soldier. a man, and finally as a fallible and human king.

Now, to counterbalance it a little (since the author really DOES tend, in my opinion,to indulge in a little hero worshipping of Henry), I am reading Edith Pargeter's "A Bloody Field at Shrewsbury" which gives different and more favorable views of Henry IV and Henry "Hotspur" Percy.

For another view of the world as it was at this time, one might also try the Stewart trilogy by Nigel Traneter, focusing on Scottish (and by necessity, French, Irish and English) politics of the day. Nigel Tranter books get five stars from em every time!

You will, however, get your money's worth from this book and enjoy it very much.

If you are only just becoming acquainted with the work of Denise Giardina, you should know that this fictionalized autobiography of Henry V is one of her earlier works (originally published in 1984). Like most of Giardina's work, it deals with human attempts to live and deal honorably with others within the structures and restraints of institutionalized power.

Henry sees his role as king as a sacred trust yet his role as king requires that he sometimes commit acts which result in death or harm to others. The conflict of his story arises as he struggles to come to terms with the ambiguity. Giardina creates a character living with enormous pain. Emotionally abandoned by his father, Harry desperately fights to be loved by those whom he must rule. This need causes him to be at odds with all around him, those who would seek to reform his kingdom as well as those who would maintain the status quo.

An absorbing read, although not a difficult one, this novel could be an interesting read for high school students in this election year.

Denise Giardina's "Good King Harry" is an in-depth exploration of one of England's most beloved characters and kings, Henry V. A comet who briefly streaked across the sky of northwest Europe, "Good King Harry" was a man who knew little of defeat yet experienced much loss, a man who bent his knee to no man but gave his soul to his beloved Welsh lass, Merryn, and a man who sought to bring peace with the sword.

Told in the first person (the language is more archaic, and slightly less accessible, than that used by other authors of medieval historical fiction such as Sharon Kay Penman or Bernard Cornwell) by Harry himself, "Good King Harry" spends as much time on Harry as a youth as it does as king. The eldest son of a warrior king, Harry is a bitter disappointment as he prefers wrestling and racing to the noble joust . . . and he also has the temerity to enjoy a little book-learnin'. The father-son disputes between king and prince are packed with as much baggage as any parent-sibling rivalry, only also with the added threat that father and son are capable of bringing swords to bear. Harry spends much of his youth balanced on the razor's edge between wilful disobedience and treason, and this battle weighs the otherwise radiant spirit down.

True, Harry does find his Falstaff in Sir John Oldcastle, who may not be as wondrous a character as Shakespeare's creation but is still a worthy comrade in cups as Harry raids the brothels and taverns of England. This relationship sours in the end, but not as expected . . . and it is a bitter schism indeed. Still, we get a lot of wenching from our beloved Prince Hal, and Giardina does not shy away from Harry diving into various beds and bottles.

Most of us know our Henry V from Shakespeare, and Giardina's Henry is true to Shakespeare's creation, even if not nearly as poetic. Her novel takes a broader scope of Henry's life, and through this wider expanse we meet Henry's true love. The Prince of Wales reluctantly goes to war in Wales to bring the rebels to heel, and in the course of doing so develops a love for his fellow Welshmen, and in particular for a Welsh maid, Merryn. A hotly contested love, Merryn is as fiery a spirit as Henry and not burdened by the weight of nobility. Giardina creates a romance for the ages with these two, and their bitter early parting is the most moving passage in the book.

Harry, as we all know, eventually becomes king and raids France. The Shakespearean Henry V is not nearly as conflicted about this raid as Giardina's, and these heavy doubts make Henry a wonderfully conflicted character. Giardina can write a battle scene very well, although she does not spend as much time with the battles as, say, Bernard Cornwell, she still throws a bunch of action at the reader.

But the high points of the book are easily Henry's emotional peaks and valleys as he contemplates his loves and his losses and the heavy price a king must pay to lead his nation. All in all, "Good King Harry" depicts a wonderful man who achieves great things -- some of them terrible, some of them astounding, but all of them great. While not the best historical fiction you can pick up, this is still an excellent book that will please fans of the Shakespearean Prince Hal/Henry V as well as those who have never experienced the Bard's take. A worthy choice.

A thoroughly enjoyable visit into the life and times of Henry V. The author brings an intimacy to the throne that others, such as W. Shakespeare, could not reach.(Partly due to proximity in time and possible social repercussions) Enough romance, violence, intrigue and history to delight any reader! I bought it as a Christmas gift for a friend after reading the first few pages in a bookstore. A week later, I had to go buy a copy for myself as I couldn't get those first pages out of my mind

I have just completed this book. If not for a rigorous work schedule I would have completed this book in only a few sittings. Giardina does a phenomenal job of capturing the feeling of the language Henry would have spoken without making it unreadable to modern readers. I studied the history of English monarchs and Shakespeare in college and found Henry V to be my favorite. Giardina actually creates a persona for Harry which is unlike most other authors, biographers and historians. Truly a great read and highly recommendable. I would have my English classes read this.

To those of us not as well versed in the British history of this time, the King Henrys either seem to blend together or get lost in the pending battle between Lancaster and York, but this novel makes Britain's King Henry V seem much more human than history traditionally depicts him. The author doesn't delve deeply enough into the Welsh history of the time, especially Owain Glyndwr, but finally makes readers understand what could have been Harry's motivations. This is a good book for history buffs as well as simply an entertaining novel for the rest of the readers. It left me with more questions than it answered, but in this instance that seemed a strength rather than a weakness.

For those who wish to get a graphic detail of what mid-evil England was like on a personal level. This book is the one. From family disputes to religious conflicts, this book sets the time and place for hardsip in England at that time. The author has become my favorite within the last few months. Her works are all outstanding. This is she first book and her talent builds with each one she writes.

Giardina has done a marvelous job of getting us a richly textured portrait of Henry, the man as well as the king. So skilled is she that it's hard at times to know where history leaves off and her imagination takes off (for instance, Merryn was NOT an historic character, but Oldcastle was).

I have to admit being just slightly disappointed that Henry's Agincourt speech paled in comparison to Shakespeare's famous "band of brothers" soliloquy, but that's to be expected.

The main thing about this book is that you really begin to care about Harry and the people around him. You feel you understand him and even pity him. Of course, whether the real Henry V was as honorable is another whole matter. But if I wanted only facts, I would have checked the non-fiction section.

A good rousing and yet thoughtful tale.