Elizabeth Moss | Fatal Fascination: What Is It About the Tudors?

"Sex and the Tudors go together like Henry VIII and failed marriages," my novelist mother used to say whenever I grabbed another Jean Plaidy historical from her bookcase.

My fav teen read was the historical bodice-ripper, all those well-thumbed paperbacks we passed under the desk at school. And how things come around! The Tudors are hugely popular again today, as are novels about sexually dominant men. Personally, I see Henry VIII as the ultimate dominant, demanding submission both in the bedchamber and in public, even acting as judge and executioner to some of his unfortunate wives. His first divorce and second marriage is a compulsive erotic tale that climaxes – if you’ll pardon the expression – with the terrifying, sensational beheading of Anne Boleyn.

So what is about the Tudors that captures our imagination? The rich garb of the nobility, perhaps, which puts our own aristocracy to shame. Those jewel-encrusted, ermine-trimmed gowns, the jaunty feathered velvet caps and gentlemen’s garters seem marvelously lavish and tactile. Let’s face it, even the most glamorous designer frock sported by Princess Kate cannot compare with Elizabeth I’s vast angel ruffs and hoop-skirted cloth of gold.

Henry VIII's youngest daughter took a leaf out of her father's book, wearing elaborate costumes designed to intimidate and impress, to bring her subjects to their knees in admiration of their goddess. Like today’s celebs, Elizabeth Tudor understood the power of a drop-dead red carpet outfit.

Hand-in-hand with display goes their prominent sexuality. Tudor women did not wear panties, for goodness’ sake. Even given the length of time it took noblewomen to be released from their elaborate gowns, that’s not playing hard to get. Nor were the men shy of advertising their wares. Noblemen and merchants alike paraded about with outrageously enlarged codpieces – a kind of pouch designed to accentuate the groin – to make them appear more virile. Some were made from shiny or brightly colored fabrics or decorated to draw more attention to them. No suit of armour was complete without a thrusting steel codpiece. I like to imagine they held competitions!

But life at the Tudor court was not just about display. It was also a dizzying tightrope between power and the axe. Perhaps it is the violent, unpredictable nature of Tudor existence that fascinates us. In the 1500s, laws were implacable: punishments harsh and immediate. Anne Boleyn fell from being Queen of England to a criminal on the scaffold in a matter of weeks. I made the difficult decision to include Anne Boleyn's beheading in my novel Wolf Bride, even though it is a romance, because her death demonstrates how high the stakes were for illicit Tudor lovers.

No doubt our twenty-first century existence would feel tame to the courtiers accused of sleeping with Anne Boleyn. Now, you might face legal action over a dubious tweet. At Henry's court you could be hanged, drawn and quartered for a treasonous remark, your estates seized by the crown, your heirs disinherited. And when the fall from power is so brutal, it makes the pleasures in life that much sweeter – and hotter.

About WOLF BRIDE

Hilary Mantel meets Sylvia Day: the first installment in a deliciously erotic trilogy, set against the sumptuous backdrop of the scandal-ridden Tudor Court.

Bound to him against her will...

Lord Wolf, hardened soldier and expert lover, has come to King Henry VIII's court to claim his new bride: a girl who has intrigued him since he first saw her riding across the Yorkshire moors.

Eloise Tyrell, now lady-in-waiting to Queen Anne Boleyn, has other ideas. She has no desire to submit to a man she barely knows and who-though she is loath to admit it-frightens her more than a little.

Their first kiss awakens in both a fierce desire that bares them to the soul. But as the court erupts into scandal around the ill-fated Queen, Eloise sees firsthand what happens when powerful men tire of their wives...

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About Elizabeth Moss

Born into a literary family, Elizabeth Moss lives with her husband and five children in South-West England, and is a keen countryside walker. She writes fun and sexy historical romances. She also writes award-winning fiction as Victoria Lamb.

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