THE QUEEN'S MUSICIAN

Mark Smeaton is born into inauspicious circumstances; his father is a poor carpenter, which, for most, would set one’s destiny in stone. However, he’s also a prodigiously talented musician—a composer, singer, and lutenist—and becomes a court musician for the king, who admires his abilities. He impresses Anne Boleyn as well, a beautiful woman of “silken faultlessness” who becomes the monarch’s second wife, and as her star rises, so does his. However, after Anne falls out of favor with the king, his own status is threatened, and he finds himself ensnared in a plot, manufactured by the king’s cunning chief minister, Thomas Cromwell, to discard her. Meanwhile, Mark engages in an imprudent flirtation with Anne’s cousin Madge Shelton, who lives in a rarefied world that no amount of success would ever allow him to enter—a predicament he grasps with both sadness and pragmatic resignation, captured intelligently by author Johnson: “I wasn’t a friend of the king. I was a lowborn commoner who was perhaps exceptionally skilled in music. In the eyes of the world, my worth had barely changed even with my new duties and responsibilities.” The story is told from the perspectives of both Madge and Mark, and she also resolutely accepts that their love is a mere “fairy tale.” The author astutely depicts a seedy world in which “politics seeped into every act”; even as Mark becomes famous and wealthy, Mark realizes the precariousness of his fortune, and the way in which he is “floating above a cesspool of terror and death.” The protagonist is a real historical figure, though little is known about him, which makes him a perfect point of departure for a dramatic and engrossing reimagining of history. It’s an era that both historians and novelists have extensively covered, but Johnson’s work remains an original and worthwhile effort.

May 27, 2025 - 05:36

Mark Smeaton is born into inauspicious circumstances; his father is a poor carpenter, which, for most, would set one’s destiny in stone. However, he’s also a prodigiously talented musician—a composer, singer, and lutenist—and becomes a court musician for the king, who admires his abilities. He impresses Anne Boleyn as well, a beautiful woman of “silken faultlessness” who becomes the monarch’s second wife, and as her star rises, so does his. However, after Anne falls out of favor with the king, his own status is threatened, and he finds himself ensnared in a plot, manufactured by the king’s cunning chief minister, Thomas Cromwell, to discard her. Meanwhile, Mark engages in an imprudent flirtation with Anne’s cousin Madge Shelton, who lives in a rarefied world that no amount of success would ever allow him to enter—a predicament he grasps with both sadness and pragmatic resignation, captured intelligently by author Johnson: “I wasn’t a friend of the king. I was a lowborn commoner who was perhaps exceptionally skilled in music. In the eyes of the world, my worth had barely changed even with my new duties and responsibilities.” The story is told from the perspectives of both Madge and Mark, and she also resolutely accepts that their love is a mere “fairy tale.” The author astutely depicts a seedy world in which “politics seeped into every act”; even as Mark becomes famous and wealthy, Mark realizes the precariousness of his fortune, and the way in which he is “floating above a cesspool of terror and death.” The protagonist is a real historical figure, though little is known about him, which makes him a perfect point of departure for a dramatic and engrossing reimagining of history. It’s an era that both historians and novelists have extensively covered, but Johnson’s work remains an original and worthwhile effort.