Beyond the Text: The Intellectual Historian's Podcast
Welcome to Beyond the Text, a podcast series dedicated to delving into intellectual history with depth and context. In a world saturated with quick takes, Beyond the Text goes the extra mile. Paying homage to Skinner's insights on the importance of context, this podcast unveils overlooked aspects of historical and intellectual narratives.
Co-hosted by Samuel Woodall and Jack Thomson, Beyond the Text explores the profound impact of thought and ideas throughout human history—forces that have driven change, shaped societies, and sparked revolutions. Beyond the mere words on the page, this podcast unravels the layers surrounding pivotal concepts and moments. Each episode meticulously examines the connections, influences, and societal currents that contribute to their evolution.
Join us on this journey to grasp the true significance of intellectual history. Whether you're an enthusiast, a curious mind, or someone intrigued by the myriad forces shaping our world, Beyond the Text provides a space for nuanced exploration. Tune in and venture beyond the surface to understand the rich tapestry of our intellectual heritage.
Samuel Woodall is a PhD candidate in Intellectual History at the University of Buckingham. He previously earned an MLitt in Intellectual History from the University of St. Andrews and a BA (Hons) in History and Politics from the University of Exeter.
Jack Thomson holds an MA in Philosophy from the University of Buckingham and brings a philosophical lens to the exploration of ideas, ensuring each discussion is both rigorous and thought-provoking.
Beyond the Text: The Intellectual Historian's Podcast
The Interviews - Rt Honourable Jesse Norman MP (Con) on "The Winding Stair": Dissecting Francis Bacon's Ambition and the Art of Historical Fiction
Join the ranks of history enthusiasts and literary connoisseurs as I, Samuel Woodall, sit down with the erudite Dr Jesse Norman, former Minister of State for Decarbonisation and Technology and author of "The Winding Stair." Step back in time to Elizabethan and Jacobean England, where the intense rivalry between Edward Coke and Francis Bacon unfolds in the pages of Dr. Norman's meticulously researched novel. As we traverse the corridors of power that shaped Bacon's political manoeuvres, we're reminded of the delicate dance between historical fact and narrative flourish. Dr. Norman unfurls the layers of Bacon's ambitions, set ablaze by his family's influence and his thirst for governmental recognition, all while staying true to the historical intricacies of the time.
Our conversation delves beyond the surface of the novel, probing the role of historical fiction in shaping our understanding of the past. We examine Bacon's personal and professional battles, dissecting how the interplay of favouritism and rivalry delayed his ascent and influenced his legacy in law and philosophy. Dr. Norman's commitment to accuracy offers a fresh lens through which we view figures like Thomas Cromwell, challenging conventional wisdom and spurring new academic discourse. We invite listeners to consider these novel interpretations and how they enrich our collective grasp of history's most enigmatic characters, as well as to reflect on the power of fiction to animate the dusty archives of time.
Welcome to a special series of Beyond the Text the interviews. I'm your host, samuel Woodall, and in this podcast series we'll embark on a captivating exploration of ideas in intellectual history and political thought through in-depth conversations with former colleagues, esteemed academics and influential public figures. Whether you're an academic, a history enthusiast or simply curious about the world of ideas, each episode provides a unique opportunity to engage with brilliant minds who have left an indelible mark on our intellectual landscape. Join me as we journey through intellectual history and political thought, guided by the insights of my guests. Welcome to Beyond the Text, where we embark on a journey beyond the surface of literature. Today, we're honoured to be joined by Dr Jesse Norman, mp, most recently Minister of State for Decarbonisation and Technology at the Department for Transport.
Speaker 1:Dr Norman's illustrious career spans academia, charity work, finance and politics, making him a uniquely insightful guest. Not only is Dr Norman a member of Parliament, but he also holds esteemed positions as a visiting research fellow at St Andrews and a fellow of all souls. His diverse background enriches his perspectives, allowing us to explore literature through multiple lenses. Our focus today is on Dr Norman's first novel, the Winding Stair, released last year. Set in the dynamic backdrop of Elizabethan and Jacobean England. This historical novel intricately weaves the rivalry between Edward Cook and Francis Bacon. Through Dr Norman's meticulous storytelling, we're transported to an era defined by political intrigue and ambition. I realise that in the busy world of parliamentary politics, mr Norman is very much booked up, so I thank him for giving up the time today. He will have to run later on in the interview, so just to let you know in advance. Join us as we delve into the pages of the Winding Stair with Dr Jesse Norman, uncovering the untold stories and hidden truths that lie beyond the text.
Speaker 2:Very nice. So just to say for the avoidance of doubt, if you are doing a, if you're going to use any of these quotes in any work you're doing, obviously I would expect and hope you will give a copy approval before you use them. Of course, yes, that's just a slight protection against my saying something egregiously stupid. Also, what I've noticed is that on two occasions I've said something in the course of the year I've been so excited to get some other thought out that I've failed to mention the fact that Eliza was. What was she? She's Bacon's first cousin once removed, isn't she, rather than his niece? Anyway, you see what I mean. Yeah, yeah, so that kind of thing. I just want to be sure we get those. You know that we don't. I'm not irrevocably wedded to something stupid Of course no, perfectly understandable.
Speaker 2:Okay, good. So, sam, where do you want to?
Speaker 1:start Right, okie dokie. So in the Winding Stair you explore Francis Bacon's life and political career. How did Bacon's upbringing and familial circumstances shape his ambition and political maneuvering?
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 2:So I mean again, you can get this from the book, but I mean on my reading of it, and it's quite useful to have the counterpart of Cook because it gives you a sense of what the options are, what the alternatives are, I feel like.
Speaker 2:But Bacon is basically born into, you know, pretty much the centre of the administrative court and you know his father, nick Bacon is lawkeeper and Nick obviously is both the brother-in-law of William Cecil and also the kind of great partner in government, and so that fact and the fact that Bacon is Francis Bacon is well known to the Queen from a very early age, you know, would have been, I think in my reading at least, a shaping set of facts, because they would have, in my reading, encouraged him to believe that the way they opened to a life of public service in supporting the court and the previous council and administration of government, but also that that life would be appropriately and properly recognised and rewarded, there would be steady progress up the curses and all of them. If one could need to do one's job in an effective and loyal way until the very top, it becomes very political.
Speaker 2:And so when it becomes clear that this isn't going to happen, and when it becomes clear to Francis on my reading that one of the reasons it isn't going to happen is that you know, he's been, as it were, held back in favour of Robert's sister, william's son, and when it becomes clear that that's been allowed and promoted, and possibly the person who's really driving this is the Queen, and therefore the Queen, contrary to calling him her young keeper, doesn't really in fact rate him. You know, I think that, given the personal control that the monarch and her advisors hold over the whole system of government, that would be a pretty shattering series of revelations and on my reading, that creates a sense of tremendous frustration and potentially jealousy, and that then has a number of effects. It pushes Francis Bacon into collateral achievement elsewhere, or if it doesn't push him, you know, he has the time to do it because he's not engaged in government, and so he does have time to write masks in the 1580s and 90s for raisin and to be a parliamentarian when Parliament is in session, which it infrequently is, and to do other things that he's interested in. But also gives him scope to write first his essays and then some of the other works in the 1590s, and then, ultimately, advancement of learning. And it's only after 1605, in fact three years afterwards, that he finally, at the age of 36, which is bold in those terms gets his 37. No wrong, 47.
Speaker 2:Born in 1561, 1608,. He becomes solicitor, so he's 47, which is really long in the tooth for someone who would have expected to kind of make his way into compensated public position in his 20s. So you can see why Bacon would have, you know, done all those other things, but also why he would have been, I might say on, why we both jealous and angry and frustrated, and I think that then carries over. The effect of that was laterally. He was attributed in part to being passed over in favour of this, but he also in due course attributes it to being regularly thwarted by Cook. And as the factional conflict of the 1590s starts to develop and Bacon's own alignment with Essex starts to become better now and and harder, more pressure itself, the fact that Cook is on the sizzle side, the official side of the equation, starts to tell more. And of course Cook manages to defeat Bacon for the post of Attorney General.
Speaker 2:Bacon is then unable to get the job of solicitor general, which Cook had vacated, and then is unable to have his suit accepted for Eliza Hatton's hand.
Speaker 2:So he's, so he's, he's being thwarted by Cook by the end of the 1590s, professionally and also romantically, publicly and privately, and that again feeds into the same thing. And the counterpart is, when he does make it in 1608, on my reading he's, he's and I think it's supported by the fact he's really pretty emphatic first of all not to lose the affection and support of the King which he spent so much time failing to acquire with Elizabeth and acquiring painstakingly with James, and therefore he becomes a great, you know, apologist, for not a great apologist but certainly an apologist and protector of the of the King's absolutist reading of Barogative and and in a way that Cook does not, cook is not, and also, of course, he is very much determined to exact some kind of revenge on Cook. And again we see that in a number of occasions, but most notably in relation to the change of offices in in in 1613, and then again in 1616, 17 over the case of commandowns. So my read overall is that those early set of shaping experiences had a pretty foundational and long-term effect.
Speaker 1:Fascinating? Yeah, most certainly. And then the next element I wanted to turn to was more looking at your narrative flow. So in your novel you navigate through complex constitutional law and historical contexts. How did you balance historical accuracy with narrative flow, especially when discussing intricate legal matters like the significance of the Magna Carta, for example?
Speaker 2:Sure, so I, it's a kind of principle of my. So there's some backstory here you need to understand, which I will just explain. I mean, very broadly speaking, there's an evolution in the way in which people think about the historical novel. So, on a conventional reconstruction of the historical novel, the historiography of the historical novel and I'm not by any means accepting this, I'm just putting it out there as the conventional wisdom. You know, the form begins with Waverly by Walter Scott, and Waverly, which was written at the beginning of the 19th century, tells a story about the Jacobite rebellion, where it's basically a plot line which has been encased in a wider piece of history that would have been very well known in Scotland, and so the history is acting as a vessel within which the plot line develops, but the characters are invented. It's not a by and large, it's not a story which aspires to enormous historical accent or accuracy, it's just located in a historical period. And then you know, you can, you can watch the historical novel kind of develop in different ways.
Speaker 2:By the time it gets to the 20th century and in particular you get to Hillary Mantell, it's become a very scholarly or can become a very scholarly activity indeed, and you will be aware that Hillary Mantell was widely fated for the amount of research in the Wolf Hall trilogy but also for the attention she pays to the language of the narrative and the dialogue in the in the in the book.
Speaker 2:So she is highly historically attuned, both in the research she does into the characters and the characters are are, by and large, real characters Thomas Cromwell, thomas Moore and the rest. Now I have an even more austere view than Hillary Mantell and on my view sorry, not on my view, but on my view that the historical novel has a very strong duty not to be misleading on any serious or significant point. And in my novel, with one or two very marginal exceptions which we can discuss, the novel is historically accurate and the greatest compliment anyone's paid to me in relation to the story, I mean it's received a lot of some reasons, but one of the nicest ones was from Alexandra Guider, who's a professor of 16th century history at Oxford, who said that she put the book on the reading list for incoming undergraduate history history.
Speaker 1:Mr Norman will be back shortly.
Speaker 2:Now. Now let me get to a couple of kind of niche points that you might think are interesting but would escape most readers. The first is this Hillary Mantell talks a lot in the wreath lectures about the importance of not misleading the reader, but she is in fact herself quite guilty of it in several dimensions. So let me give you three. One is language. So I don't actually, as a man who spent a lot of time embedded in the language of the 16th and 17th century, I don't myself regard Hillary Mantel's language as fully persuasive. And if you take the first chapter of Wolfholt, just to begin, at the beginning it uses the word sniffle and the word gossip uses an abstract noun to mean chatter. Neither of those is the 16th or 17th century usage. They both come from the 19th century and there's no such thing as gossip in the abstract sense in the 16th and 17th century. A gossip is a person, generally a woman, who chatters, but gossip as an abstract thing is not a word that you find at that time. Now there is no word in my book that comes after the year 1699. So the reason you have a profound sense of immersion in the language of the time is because you're in the language of the time.
Speaker 2:Now, the reason that works is because it's the language of Shakespeare and therefore, provided you cut out anything that's really very poetic and therefore in some sense artificially flowery, which I have used, but only in a few very specific cases poetic contexts. Some of the poetry in the book is written by me, but I don't tell you which bits of the book. That's part of the joy of it. But the other thing is that and you can't have any kind of zoons you violate, you know, any of that kind of nonsense. But if you pair it back, it's possible to construct a narrative tone which is recognizably of the time, shakespearean, intelligible to us, although a little bit removed. And also that has the supreme merit that I can then bring in unchanged contemporary documents and fold them into the narrative without the reader detecting that the narrative has changed in its style at all. And so I can put a lot of Pranthus, bacon's letters into the third person and say you know, bacon writes to the king saying, and using the historical present, saying you know I would advise you.
Speaker 2:XYZPQR and you don't notice the change because it's just Bacon speaking, but speaking remotely. So you can do that because of the tonal approach that I've taken in the historical present which I've used, which allows the result of that. So sorry, that's one level, level of language. The second level is a level of character. So Harry Mantell invents a relationship which we have no warrant for thinking existed. So she has Thomas Cromwell have an affair with Johan, who is his wife, liz's sister, after Liz dies I don't think there's any evidence in the records there. And Harry Mantell in the third volume also invents a new character which is an unknown daughter of, allegedly born in Antwerp when Cromwell was in Antwerp, or Kanaka, or Yenaka, you know, have you pronounced it? And again, that person is, I think, unknown to history. But the most problematic is lies in the character, because the issue lies, for Hillary Mantell, lies in the characterization of Moore. So Thomas Moore, as you may know, was lionized in a book called A Play, called A man of Four Seasons, made into a film and a phenomenal play. And a phenomenal film they are too. But and then obviously you got right up Hillary Mantell's nose because she reverses the polarity. So in the man of Four Seasons, thomas Cromwell, is quite a really nasty man of business who kind of maneuvers more into a situation in which he won't sign the oath of supremacy and ultimately has his head cut off for it, which is true. The manipulation is, you know, is bold and bold's. Characterization of Moore as a kind of liberal-minded individualist with a strong emphasis on who writes is nonsense, because we know Moore, although a great wit and very much admired and liked by many of his contemporaries, was a very enthusiastic burner of heretics and you know, and was very a strong opponent of heresy in all its forms. So Moore is a complex character. He's got good size and he's got bad size right. I mean, you know, obviously Erasmus adored him and many other people admired him and liked him and have done ever since. But you know he had a tough, nasty side to it. Now, of course, the effect, but what Mantell does is to depict more as a torturer. We know more was not a torture, more says more swears and out that he's not a torturer. There's one human being on earth in the history of humanity we can be certain took it no seriously in the face of God. It was Thomas Moore, since he died on exactly that basis. So so so here in Mantell is is unfortunately guilty of breaking her own re-selection. No misleading now, I Don't break that rule, and the slight exception is when I there's a letter relatively early on from bacon to burly, kind of pleading his, his, his, his personal worth and and making a proposal for a new institution of learning.
Speaker 2:And we don't. We know that bacon did make a proposal in a letter to Burley. We don't have the letter. I wrote that letter. The letter looks like all the other letters because the reader can't tell the difference. But that rat is in fact written by me and and and so we know the book mode was. We don't know what was a proposal for, but we do know. Obviously he was obsessive about research, because it comes in the advanced learning 605, only 20 years later, our 20 years later. And and the second is because it was, I mean his his father had had done all this work for Henry the eighth, on the idea of creating a fifth in a court and around about 1540. So we do know that this was very close to bacon's heart. So it's a spec, it's a historical speculation. Now let me give you a couple things. I've got a girl in a few minutes, but let me just a couple of things that might be relevant or interesting search. No one really knows about the book I might find you so so.
Speaker 2:So one is that the Book, oh yeah, so. So there are therefore two senses in which the book can be superior to a novel. So one of the ways in which people think, that's right, the novel can be superior to history. You have the period. So one way in which, the obvious way in which people think about a novel being superior to the history, is that a novel can, can, can, can capture a sense of what it was like at the time, or Supposedly capture a sense of what it was like. You know the. So the quote unquote lived experience of the time. I give you two more ways in which and sorry, in Hillary Mantell Gives you another way in which a novel can be, can be historically more valuable as as valuable as history. I'm not suggesting a novel in history. A novel replaces history, right, it actually doesn't, but it's history's history.
Speaker 2:I know it's not, yeah but but the novel has, has historical value. It's all about historical value, or can do, and one example is that it can give you interpretations that color one's reading of the period and and and and the gavel of this of Hillary Mantell's is the reading. So she reads Fromwell's motivation early on in his career in the 1520s as being about avenging what she sees as the destruction, what he sees as a destruction, of Woolsey, and For that he, you know he on here in Antel's reading that's all about Woolsey's dislike of Anne Boleyn and the people around her and they basically end up destroying him. And so when? So the the driver of Fromwell's desire to destroy Berlin is in part that you know it's for revenge.
Speaker 2:Now we know from Darwin McCulloch has written the you know, my father best book on Thomas Cromwell that this rather color his own interpretation. I mean it wasn't an original idea. It's not an original idea, but it is a but it is an elaboration of an idea that had been circling around and it's proven very influential when and and Darwin, by any Calculus, is a top historian. So that's quite a significant achievement. What I have done in my book is something that I wouldn't put on a par with this, but I've offered a New historical reading of the 1621 Parliament and If you want to go into detail in that, you can go on to the St Andrews intellectual histories page and Listen to the talk I gave there last year, if you haven't already which is on this topic.
Speaker 2:I'm what that? And in a sentence, what it does is to try to rehabilitate not actually not to rebuild it, but to, but, to, to, to Create a reading of the 1621 Parliament in which Bacon's fall, far from being read, as you know, an inexplicable, catastrophic or catastrophic event, like a kind of natural disaster which no one could have foreseen come. So I don't really like that at all. I think it's. I think it's the product of Okay, thanks, we can go on a bit longer. I think it is the product of a of. I think it's.
Speaker 2:I think I think cook has very deliberately set things up so that he can destroy bacon in retaliation, revenge for Bacon's role in in getting him kicked out of being chief Justice of Kings bench in 1616 to 17, and I think there's a lot of evidence for why that should be the case. And when you tie in a proper reading of that evidence with a Kind of a nuanced understanding of parliamentary procedure and time and Precedent or authority, as it would be better thought, thought of, I think you get a much more convincing explanation for what's going on and the way I handle that. As you remember, remember, the book is I, I tell the story from Bacon's part of you and it just feels like, you know, this is the, this is essentially the conventional view. I'm running along, suddenly a trap door opens, gone, and Then, and then I, and then there's a volt, there's a twist, and the twist is to go back and reconstruct the events from Cook's point of view, explaining why cook is Responsible all the way through.
Speaker 2:So that that's, and that is my subversive new reading of Bacon's fall in the early part of the 1621 Parliament, and I think that's a historically interesting idea and you know, I invite historians to To ask whether it's true or not. You know, I'm not, I'm not, I'm offering it. I think it's, I think it's fun, I think it's fun and so, but it's, it's doing something historical, novel, that really hasn't been done before, which is that it's fantastic and, as you say, using the novel, form?
Speaker 2:Yeah, and, by the way, if you look at them, you probably have not, but it's on Spotify, you can just listen to lecture. Give you much more detail as to how that work. Yeah, and then obviously the final, the final. The last Volta is the Hobbes memorandum, and in the review of the book in the LRB by Stephen Sedley, you may recall, you know, stephen was quite a long way along the line of thinking how marvelous it was that I've managed to discover an entirely new piece, kind of writing by Thomas Hobbes. Yeah, a massive historical find if anyone had done that.
Speaker 2:So so I'm tragically, I am, I haven't done that, but I have had marvelous fun, yeah take it and even, and even, by the way I don't know if you've noticed, no one will notice, but but even in that, if you release a giardine Alan Stewart's biography of of Baker, you will discover, by the way, when you send me a, the audio recording of this. Certainly, yeah, that would be very good. Thanks, I think, and you probably can also, if you look at it, you've already also did the author in the transcript. Anyway, it's just, it's like all of these things that constantly pulls out good things for me that I never remember off.
Speaker 2:It's like, yeah, I would have to vote in a second. But one of the things that Happens there we go, one of the things that happens In my, in in the in the Hobbes memorandum at the end, is I basically kill the Lisa Jardine and Alan Stewart idea that that that's the reason why they can. They give far too much time to thinking about Bacon's death as caused by excessive inhalation of opiates. Um, and there's no doubt that bacon in his experimental way, and he was a tremendous hyper-convict, as you know.
Speaker 2:So you know, there's no doubt he was you know inhaling, you know essence of poppy and all that stuff, but there's no evidence for being died in it and I'm no reason to divert from the traditional story as told by John Aubrey. So the fun thing for me has been to to just use Hobbes To stab that thought in the head. And of course, again, you have to be very familiar with this geography to understand what's going on there. But it's quite fun.
Speaker 1:No, it's certainly fantastic. Well, thank you very much indeed. It's very, very kind of you to give up your time.
Speaker 2:It's an absolute pleasure I'm so sorry I have to go now, but I had better go, I've got a vote on the new clause one of the National Reconvictions, etc.
Speaker 1:We built marvelous Well, good luck.
Speaker 2:And send me the recording of transcript. You can, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:I'll get that done as soon as possible. Fantastic. Thank you, jesse Pleasure, lovely to see you. Bye, thank you, bye you.
