Thomas becket biography book
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By interweaving a close study of the original texts and a nuanced consideration of their historical context, the book provides a persuasive reading of the martyred archbishop of Canterbury and the twelfth century he inhabited. . The story has been told for generations; Michael Staunton does it well here, paying due attention to the hagiographical bias of most of the evidence.”
Times Literary Supplement
"Well illustrated and fluently written for a general audience .
We see a man who was, by turns, worldly, aloof and, ultimately, exasperatingly intransigent and unafraid to die for his beliefs. . Succinct but thorough, restrained but passionate, this is a perfect book."
Karen Sullivan, Bard College
"This compelling account of the life of Thomas Becket is an enthralling story of the saint’s life set within the wider context of the world in which he lived and died.
breathes new life into an oft-told tale' Financial Times
'Vivid and extremely readable. Reading of the assassination is almost unbearably intense and brings tears to one's eye' Daily Express
'Compelling, marvellously measured, entertainingly astute, and in places positively moving' TheIndependent
'A beautifully layered portrait of one of the most complex characters in English history .
His previous books include My Heart is My Own: The Life of Mary Queen of Scots, winner of the 2004 Whitbread Biography Award and the Marsh Biography Award, the highly acclaimed dual biography A Daughter's Love: Thomas and Margaret More and a history, Tudor England, which has sold over 250,000 copies worldwide.
Thomas Becket and His World
Reviews
“Thomas Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury, murdered in his cathedral in 1170 after seven years of bitter quarrel with his old friend Henry II, is one of the most well-known and well-documented figure in English history.
The book is a triumph.
'
Stephen Church, Professor in Medieval Studies, University of Lincoln
From the winner of the 2004 Whitbread Biography Award and the Marsh Biography Award John Guy, comes Thomas Becket, a lively and enlightening new book that brings a colossal figure of British history vividly to life.
This is the man, not the legend .
Yet the Thomas Becket that emerges from these pages is not a distant medieval churchman, but a complex and conflicted human being, seemingly more alive than most people we know today. By the time we reach the thrilling crescendo of the last chapters, the book has become a meditation on the complexities of heroic virtue.
Torn between his duty to serve his king (and onetime friend) and his duty to serve his Church, Thomas experiences in his own life the tension between political and ecclesiastical authority that dominated so much of medieval history. Michael Staunton has made a latter-day entry into the veritable library of Saint Thomas of Canterbury biographies with his Thomas Becket and His World.
'New Criterion
In this beautifully fluent new biography, Michael Staunton brings out the challenges and contradictions running through the controversial life and death of Thomas Becket, archbishop of Canterbury.
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A triumph' The Times
'Suspenseful, meticulously researched . By the time we reach the thrilling crescendo of the last chapters, the book has become a meditation on the complexities of heroic virtue. By interweaving a close study of the original texts and a nuanced consideration of their historical context, the book provides a persuasive reading of the martyred archbishop of Canterbury and the twelfth century he inhabited.
Michael Staunton wears his scholarship and erudition with a lightness of touch which is awe-inspiring. .