Wolf Hall - Season 2 - The Mirror & the Light

You didn’t enjoy it because they had become real people in the here and now to you. Which is very much a compliment.

I hope people see it as a complement when I say I didn't enjoy the final episode. It was too upsetting, watching it all unfold. I felt just the same about the book. The closer I got to the end the less I wanted to keep reading.

Ralph Vaughan Williams is also known as Rafe.

There is a character called Rafe in Dr Faustus, by Christopher Marlowe. And also a Rafe in Knight Of The Burning Pestle, written in the early 1600s. That was obviously the spelling in those days.

Do you think she wrote it as Rafe so people would pronounce it properly? I never knew that Ralph was pronounced Rafe.

Hilary Mantel wrote the name as Rafe, although in her Author's notes on Tudor places she referred to him as' Rafe (or Ralph) Sadler (or Saddler)'. He died in his eighties, after a long and happy marriage,the richest commoner in England, leaving seven surviving children. His house, Bricke Place, now called Sutton House, remains in the middle of Hackney, in the care of the National Trust (which worries me somewhat.)

I feel bereft. This has been an impressive and outstanding production from beginning to end and I'm going to watch it all again and this time savour all the details of costumes and sets.

It was good to read the reviews - thank you FGT2

People have said that HM was in love with Cromwell, and I confess that Sssh! I am a little bit in love with him too. The way he ran rings round his interrogators was a masterpiece.

As someone has already said, the cast, the costumes, the settings, the script - all were pitch perfect. And Mark Rylance, one of the greatest actors we have at the moment.

Deedaa

It struck me last night that I totally believed in these people. They weren't actors in costumes, they were people wearing their own clothes and walking about in their own homes. I've never felt that so strongly about any other show.

Same here, and it’s the mark of great acting, credible plot and dialogue isn’t it?

merlotgran

Surely Ralph is the correct English spelling of the name that was once pronounced Rafe. It's only in recent times that the spelling has been changed to match the pronunciation. The same as Shaun for Sean.

Ralph could also be pronounced as it is spelled but I don’t think the name Rafe actually existed until the 20th century.

Happy to be corrected if I’m wrong.

I think you’re probably right, will have to consult google.

Thanks for posting that beautifully written review, FGT the interrogation of Cromwell was superb, pitch perfect!

I never tire of reading the reviews, do you? Here’s another to share:

By Louisa Mellor, December 15, 2024 -

“Cromwell kept his composure and shrewdness until the last. Moments from his death, this master of government mastered himself to deliver a final speech the real meaning of which was a secret shared between him and us. Only we could see Wolsey in that scaffold crowd, and so only we understood that when Cromwell prayed heartily aloud for his master’s forgiveness, he didn’t mean Henry. Stripped of his titles, freedom and life, Cromwell ensured that his last words at least belonged to him and to Wolsey – the only man he would ever call father.

It was elegantly done, as was the death scene. Instead of seeing the axe fall, or hearing it connect while the horror played out across anonymous faces in the crowd, we heard the sound of a bee buzzing and were transported with Cromwell to Launde Abbey, his little heaven here on Earth. It’s the place he told his daughter Jenneke that he wanted to retire when all his work is done, and where he’d once imagined her waiting for him in the doorway. She wasn’t waiting there in this version of the scene, presumably because this wasn’t Cromwell’s imagination but his final reward.

What was behind Henry wanting to hear Cromwell’s letter read aloud a second time? Not his conscience, but his vanity. The pleas for mercy were passed over in favour of a line about Henry living “ever-young” – an idea that clearly appealed to him. However many magic rings Cromwell was rumoured to wear on his hand, he didn’t have the power to turn this ageing, impotent, sclerotic king back into a robust roaring boy, which to Henry, was unforgivable. Oh well, Henry, perhaps marrying a teenager will help? No? Shame.

Cromwell’s fate was sealed long before his arrest – when Henry’s ego was stung by his introduction to Anna of Cleves, or further back during Gardiner and Norfolk’s horse trading with the French. There was certainly no hope in what he interpreted as hopeful signs. Still, he went down fighting. That glorious 18-minute interrogation scene (eat your heart out, Line of Duty) of him facing his accusers and verbally delivering jabs, crosses and uppercuts to their every allegation was wonderful to watch. ( “I cannot always wait for the slow grindings of your brain, my lord” is going straight into my email signature) – or it would have been if we could have shared his confidence that he still had a future to fight for.

Cromwell dominated his attackers, ably defending himself from accusations both ludicrous (the purple doublet, the enchanted ring, the receipt of a pair of gloves) and legitimate (the promise to Catherine, telling Call-Me he’d take arms against the king, not succeeding in killing Pole). He missed no chance to threaten, undermine or twist the knife, and as a result, Call-Me looked as though he would vomit at any moment, while Richard Riche shrank to an ant faced with his terrifying former master bellowing “LOOK AT ME” mid-defence. If there’d been a jury, Cromwell would have walked free, with a fat purse for damages.

Alas, there was no jury because the verdict had already been decided. Cromwell only realised that when Rafe told him that his London home of Austin Friars was being dissolved, and as a result he was a different man in round two – drained and defeated. The shift in tone even forced Norfolk to do something other than hold his nose at Cromwell and call him a plebby poo-pants (this hasn’t been one of Timothy Spall‘s more nuanced performances), when he came out with that strikingly insightful point about Henry seeing them all as merely his hunting dogs. Gardiner too, dropped the schadenfreude for a second and feared for his own safety like a human being instead of a hissing snake.

Even condemned, Cromwell still organised and instructed. Son Gregory and nephew Richard were to repudiate him to save themselves. A bruised and bloody Christophe was told not to fight. He even had words of encouragement for his executioner, from one axe-man to another. If dying bravely was his goal, then he achieved it.
Crucially, Cromwell didn’t die alone. As the birds sang on the morning of his execution, Wolsey returned and granted Thomas the mercy he’d been refused by the king. Or perhaps Thomas’ conscience granted it to himself, depending on how you see the Cardinal’s apparitions. Either way, the accusation of betrayal that had undone him more than any allegation of treason against the king, was soothed. “Well, I dare say daughters sometimes get things wrong,” offered Wolsey.

Perhaps that was the “Light” in this moribund episode. Since Dorothea’s accusation, Cromwell has been his own painful “Mirror” reflecting on the man he is and the man he was. His conscience has been pricked by his past, hence those recurring night terrors. Now, he’s made right with Wolsey’s ghost, and given the many parallels between his death and that of Anne Boleyn, maybe with his own life, he’s paid his debt there too. The nightmares are over. It’s his time to walk in the sweet, quiet air.
All episodes of Wolf Hall: The Mirror and the Light are available to stream now on BBC iPlayer.

It was brilliant, credible and believable. Rafe Sadler had a long successful life, he was a secretary before Cecil, for ER I.

Richard Cromwell, Thomas Cromwells nephew, was the grandfather of Oliver Cromwell.

I read, in the past, that there's been quite a debate among historians about the chaotic circumstances of the execution. Was Norfolk responsible for paying someone to get the executioner drunk, or was it Henry's final vindictive act to deliberately arrange for someone inexperienced and incompetent to do the deed?

Surely Ralph is the correct English spelling of the name that was once pronounced Rafe. It's only in recent times that the spelling has been changed to match the pronunciation. The same as Shaun for Sean.

Ralph could also be pronounced as it is spelled but I don’t think the name Rafe actually existed until the 20th century.

Happy to be corrected if I’m wrong.

foxie48

I get so absorbed in something as brilliant as Wolf Hall and totally forget I'm an old lady. I'm glad Rafe lived a long and successful life, few seemed to!

I can’t help but feel that Rafe was Cromwell’s legacy. He learned how to survive and prosper from him. He made mistakes during his life but knew how to surmount them.

I get so absorbed in something as brilliant as Wolf Hall and totally forget I'm an old lady. I'm glad Rafe lived a long and successful life, few seemed to!

It struck me last night that I totally believed in these people. They weren't actors in costumes, they were people wearing their own clothes and walking about in their own homes. I've never felt that so strongly about any other show.

“Rafe died in 1587, aged around 80, and was known as the "richest commoner in England" at the time of his death”.
Looks like the boy did well!

foxie48

MayBee70 I'm a little bit in love with Rafe!

I just want to give him a hug and a hankie. I wonder what happened to him ( going to Google it)…

MayBee70

Ilovecheese

merlotgran

I was surprised to see Cromwell kneeling at the block still wearing his outer clothing with his hair loose. How could the executioner see his neck?

There has been so much attention to detail throughout that I wondered if this would really of happened.

I have read before that the executioner have to have three goes with the axe before the head was severed.

I read that Norfolk and his cronies paid the executioner to make it as painful as possible. Norfolk himself went on to escape execution because Henry died before the date of it had been set.

Norfolk was a truly ghastly, diabolical man.

Yes, loved the series, as well as the book.

A masterpiece .

Aww what a great series.
Loved every minute of it.
Well done BBC so sad Hilary not here to see the series.

Did Gregory do as his father wished and disown him to save himself does anyone know?

MayBee70 I'm a little bit in love with Rafe!

Rafe was the one that broke my heart. And Call Me. The way he and the other guy whose name escapes me portrayed the way that they had to work to convict Cromwell but were so uneasy and ashamed of themselves for doing so was acting at it’s finest. I still think Timothy Spall was miss cast, though.