So. Ten years ago this week, I sat on a train from Stratford-Upon-Avon and said to my partner, “I’m going to stitch that. It makes me want to do something big and ambitious.” The “that” was the Royal Shakespeare Company production of Wolf Hall, adapted by Hilary Mantel and Mike Poulton, and 1 February 2014 was the first time I saw it. And ten years on, I am still stitching it.
My current work - The Cromwell Narrative Cloth - is taking its time so sharing progress is necessarily slow. That being the case, I thought I would write a series of posts that show some of my earlier work, inspired by Hilary Mantel’s Cromwell trilogy, and stitched over the past decade: The First Wolf Hall Quilt, The Anne Triptych, The Book of Queens, The Weepers, The Cromwell Thames Rolls, and numerous smaller pieces.
But really, I need to go back further. Another decade back.
I properly discovered Hilary Mantel’s books in 2004. I think. I had had a copy of A Place of Greater Safety since 1995, I bought it with a book token given to me as a leaving present for a job. But it was Giving Up the Ghost that first found a central place in my life. I have had endometriosis very severely for most of my life, and I had multiple surgical interventions to try to deal with it. Nothing worked. I had a real battle with the medical profession - male and female - who were more concerned with ‘saving my fertility’ than my quality of life. I never had children. I just wanted the pain to stop.
In April 2004 I had a hysterectomy. Finally. Before he would agree to operate, the surgeon insisted on meeting my partner to check that he didn’t mind not having children. Being splendid, my partner met the surgeon as requested, and made it absolutely and utterly clear that it was my decision, given that endometriosis had invaded my body. By then, it was too late to deal with all the endometriosis, which had spread everywhere inside me and was - so I was told - too risky to deal with. I still have endometriosis left inside me. It still flares up. I still have rage.
While I was recovering from my hysterectomy, Giving Up the Ghost was serialised on Radio 4 as Book of the Week. Listening to it helped me during my convalescence, which was also the time that I started to make my very first (never finished) quilt: a nine-patch floral pieced over papers. I still find bits of that quilt hanging around the house, like a hangover.
And here I find that my mind has played a trick on me. I have a very clear memory of listening to Giving Up the Ghost on Radio 4 in 2004 and stitching while I recovered from my hysterectomy. It spoke to me because it was about the experience of living with endometriosis, a disease which, back then, had little public profile. But when I check old BBC listings, I discover that Giving Up the Ghost was Radio 4’s Book of the Week in July 2003. I can’t make the timing work.
In my story - how I tell it to myself - I started to make my first quilt when I was recovering from my hysterectomy, and Giving Up the Ghost was on the radio while I was sewing. This is absolutely fixed in my mind. This is true. Except - I find - it isn’t. I can only suppose that I was recovering from another - failed - surgical intervention in 2003 when I heard Giving Up the Ghost on the radio, and perhaps I read the book in 2004. I know I definitely had the paperback then. Or did I start quiltmaking a year earlier than I believe? Or maybe Book of the Week had nothing to do with any of my many convalescences.
My quilting practice and Hilary Mantel’s work have always, therefore, been entwined in my head. I made my first Cromwell-related piece in 2014, finishing it on the day Wolf Hall completed its West End run. And since then, I have been true to what I said on the train in February 2014. “I’m going to stitch that.”
In my studio
Lots of Cromwell Narrative Quilt work. A sketch of Thomas Cromwell at the Battle of Garigliano. And is that him holding a snake I can see? Quite a bit of reading about what’s we know - and what we don’t - about Cromwell’s early life and how that ties up with Hilary’s Cromwell Trilogy.
I have to take care not to stitch too much - it’s very tempting to want to make the most of the time I have at the moment, and to see progress - but I must also take care of my hands, wrists, and elbows. Handstitching can be hazardous! So I am trying to make sure I divide time between stitching, sketching, painting and research.
What caught my eye?
I went to my beloved Isle of Wight last week, and passed through Yarmouth on Friday. My eye was caught by an old door - and it turned out to be the entrance to Yarmouth Castle, completed in the last year of Henry VIII’s reign in 1547. It was part of a project to strengthen coastal defences that began in 1539. It’s low season on the Island at the moment, and the Castle wasn’t open so the strong door kept me out. But it means I will need to return fairly soon so I can have a look round.
Firstly, I’m sorry to hear that you’ve had such a tough time health wise.
Secondly, I can’t believe it’s 10 years since Wolf Hall at the RSC! They were great plays.
Thirdly, I’m curious - has someone commissioned you to do the quilt? Or are you doing it for love?
Thank you
While I did not suffer from endometriosis, I was diagnosed with BRCA2 breast cancer in 2004 and was put in the position of choosing a hysterectomy to prevent ovarian cancer. Surgical menopause can be brutal and so, my heart goes out to you -- you have been through so, so much between the pain and discomfort of the endometriosis, the physicians' treatment and of course, abrupt menopause.
Your stitching of course...is amazing. I so enjoy that you're sharing your experiences with us all and look forward to following along.♡