Elliemarianna said

I think Juliane means Katherine Howard.

Oh! Gosh, silly me, I thought she meant right after Jane he became infatuated with someone who looked like Anne meaning the next wife, AOC. But yeah it is pretty werid that he not only became infatuated with Anne’s cousin and someone who looked like her but also married her, you’d think he’d stick to obident blondes, right?

Thank you Bella. That was just a snippet from my story so yes there is a lot more. I just thought it had a place in this thread talking about Jane. In my story which is started by Henry when Jane dies and goes on to near his death he muses and talks of all his wives and some others but ultimately the whole point of it is his defence for Elizabeth of his actions in basically murdering her mother. It wont end up a book as in a book but perhaps has the makings of an ebook or something I don’t know yet how it will turn out.

I laughed about the head gear too. I think Maggyann has nailed Henry’s attitude towards Jane. I would love to read more. I agree Bella, it’s not that often that we get to read anything from Henry’s viewpoint. So far I like how he is thinking.

Henry was as changable as the weather. One minute he was passion hearts and flowers, the next he was all bluster, ballast and brimstone.
I think underneath all his regalness he was like a little boy lost and like some many kids these days what he saw he wanted and once he got it he didn’t want it after all. Hope that makes sence.
Anne Boleyn being the exception there, as he wanted her, and what was more he needed her to although he didn’t know why. But once he’s got her he didn’t know what to do with her, so got bored, and moved on to his next conquest.
Woman to him were expendable commodities, mearly the end to a means.
Henry was alledged to have said when Jane was in Labour and told that it was a choice between her life or the child’s life, he said that the child must live, another wife can be found easily enough. It’s possible I suppose but judging by his genuine heartfelt greif for Jane I doubt it.
However if he did say that, did he really believe that woman or more to the point Princesses would actually be falling over themselves to marry Henry? Must have an ego the size of Bournemouth. Anne of Cleves was a desperate act of a desperate man (Cromwell) to keep control of the king.
Now Henry had his son, and the Seymour Brothers were now all powerful because of Jane’s sacrifice, Cromwell had to do something fast to take back the reigns of power. I don’t believe Cromwell was entirely to blame for this who debarkle with Anne of Cleves, some of the fault lies with Henry’s people, who built Anne up in Henry’s eyes as some sort of a goddess come down from heaven. I personally think that AOC wasn’t too bad at all, just a little simple and too trusting (I don’t mean in a stupid way) she was perhaps expecting this Golden haired God to sweep her off her feet and ride off with her into the sunset on a big white horse. She must have had some sort of a mental picture in her head of what she thought Henry looked like, and even more flattered by the fact that a King from a distant land, and lets face Cleves was hardly one of the big provinces around at the time, just an obscure little villiage more or less, was so enamoured of her from just her picture, that he made his mind up to marry her without even a dowry. Anne was quite old by Tudor standards to be getting married (25) anyway. So you could understand her revolted behaviour when she came face to face with El Stinko for the first time. She was as horrified as he was.
What did Henry really think when he saw Anne? Yes we know he wasn’t happy, but did he believe what he saw in the picture or did he know that Holbien had a tendency to be a poetic with his paintbrush now and again? Did he think that perhaps AOC was another A.B in looks, and KOA in temprement?
I believe too that Henry did love all his Queen’s but purely for his own selfish reasons.

Of course! Henry said so himself! In his will, he wanted to be buried next to Jane. Henry was just obsessed with Anne and just wanted a son. You guys forget that if he truly loved her she would not have been beheaded. That’s DEFIANTLY not true love. Making Anne and Henry’s relationship a love story is really sad, in the end, Henry disliked Anne.

I think Henry was tortured by guilt for the rest of his life after he had hacked Anne up. He did truly love Anne but because of what he did, he had to force himself to hate her if that makes sence it was his way of coping with the fact he had killed her. He had to keep telling himself that Anne was wh*re etc and deserved to die. On the surface he made himself believe it but deep down he knew that everything that was said of her was and an out and out lie.
The mear fact that he said that Jane was his beloved wife in his will doesn’t make it so. He did love Jane but only from the view point of the fact she had given hm the one thing he had craved since 1509… A son. If Jane had, had another daughter I doubt she would have been around long enough to make the same mistake twice. Henry would have found a way of ridding himself of her. But not in such a dramatic way as he did Anne.

When all was said and done however Henry’s only real true love was himself.
His Wives and Mistresses were only there to booster up his ego.
That was evident in his fifth Marriage. He knew that he was a stinking overweight mountain of lard, but in his mind he saw himself as the golden haired God of his youth and he wanted a trophy wife, to prove to himself and the rest of the world that he had still got it. He and King Francois of France were bitter rivals from the start always trying to outdo each other with the woman. Francois at this time was married to the Emperor’s sister and marriage which I’m given to believe wasn’t exactly all wine and roses, so how else to rub it in his face that whilst he (Francois) was stuck in a boring marriage with a woman who gets on his tits, Henry had a young vivacious teenage nymphomaniac for his wife. Henry in short gave Francois the old 2 fingered salute.

Sorry one more thing – I agree when Catherine says it’s sad that we healthier humans don’t understand the relationship between henry and Anne and almost force it to be a beautiful romance when it wasn’t, just to allow it to make some sort of sense to us…..us healthier humans like to wear rose coloured glasses I can’t remember where, maybe in youtube, one switched on comment said that The Tudors show had romance in it to allow the show to be a big hit that’s all, because who doesn’t like a love story

Henry said he loved Jane the best. (rolling eyes to heaven) If he truly loved Jane, he wouldn’t have been looking at other women and saying he married her too quickly. And he wouldn’t have told her to stop asking about his living children, but to look to the children she was supposed to give him. And he wouldn’t have told her to keep her mouth closed when she stuck up for those involved in the Pilgrimage of Grace. If he loved her, he wouldn’t have done or said any of this. She would have been listened to as a partner, not treated like a brood mare.

When he was asked which wife he loved best, Henry was a dying old man looking back and seeing that only Jane had succeeded in giving him what he desperately wanted in life, a son. How unfortunate for him that she died. Woe is he. She would have given him more sons.
Henry loved Henry and wanted what was good for him. He loved them all for about a minute. So yeah, in that minute when he was asked he said Jane was his true wife, and we’ve had to live with it. Had he lived, that opinion no doubt would have changed. You just never know with him.

I agree Anyanka. If Jane had produced another daughter, a stillborn child or Eddy had died in infancy I doubt he would have wanted to be within an inch of her. I actually wonder what would have happened if Lard Arse had lived just that little bit longer and Eddy had died during his life time.
My guess is Lard Arse would have paniced and got Mary and Elizabeth married off a bit rapid so that they could produce a grandson to rule instead.
I wonder why he didn’t marry Mary and Elizabeth off? I can understand him not doing it before 1544, as in the eyes of the law (such as it was) they were considered as bastards, but once Lard arse had re-instated them they were valuable pawns in the marriage market.
Granted Mary was the only child who was seen as legimiate in the eyes of the Catholic faction, but even so she was getting old, so a child of her body would be more desirable especially if it was a boy. I’m guessing it is all down to Ego with Lard Arse. If Eddy had died infancy and Mary was married off and had a Boy, that boy would be heir to the throne, the thought of that turned his stomach and the child would have stolen some of his stage show, and he wouldn’t like that.
Whatever Lard arse was or wasn’t he was a greedy limelight hugging tw*t.
Lard Arse loved only one person……. Lard Arse.

Honestly? No. I, as most people, think that he only claimed that Jane was his true love because she wasn’t around long enough for Henry to tire of her, or for Jane to really displease him otherwise, and more importantly, because she gave him a male heir. Everything that has been reported and mentioned here before, that Henry said he wished he hadn’t married her after seeing attractive women at court, the fact that he basically threatened to see to it that she’d share Anne’s fate if she meddled in his affairs, it doesn’t really speak for his true love for her. I too wonder what he saw in her. It was, after all, probably her virtue and meekness, and her demure, humble and submissive manner, that Henry appreciated after all these years of Anne’s often tiring fierceness. I don’t know how much of her demeanor was an act, but I do think part of it definitely was. Perhaps this was also the only way to make up for her plainness and her lack of wits compared to some of his other wives. As for the Anne’s downfall, there are actually authors who believe that Jane actively contributed to it, stopping at nothing. I don’t want to believe that she’s to be responsible for it any more than Anne is for Katherine of Aragon’s fate, however, I do believe that even if she knew Anne was to die in order for her to become Queen, she would not have cared. The scene in The Tudors where Jane is trying on gowns and jewelry whilst Anne is executed may have been over the top, but I personally think in a metaphorical way it isn’t too far from the truth.

I guess we’ll never know who his true love was, but I think it’s foolish to exclude Anne Boleyn because he had her executed. One’s natural reaction is to say that you cannot have someone killed you truly loved, but there is a fine line between love and hate, and I think whatever it was between Henry and Anne, it had so much passion that sadly, it could only end with a big bang. Furthermore I don’t necessarily believe that Katherine of Aragon was his true love, after all it was a political marriage rather than one out of love, although I don’t deny that especially in their younger years, there was a lot of affection between them.