Hilary Mantel Quotes

Of course I had written a film about Elizabeth I, and I loved the Tudor period, and I think at the time Working Title and I had debated on whether to do Elizabeth I or Henry VIII. I'd always wanted to do Henry VIII. Like Elizabeth, I'd had this feeling that it had never properly been addressed.

But as my voice coach keeps saying, if we actually spoke the way they imagine the Elizabethan voice might have been, we wouldn't be able to understand it.

The first Elizabeth film was an absolute travesty historically. It really was sloppy. Things like 'The Other Boleyn Girl' and 'The Tudors,' people's perception is distorted because of these. It matters to me as a historian, because I spend my life trying to get it right.

Few people know anything of the English history but what they learn from Shakespear; for our story is rather a tissue of personal adventures and catastrophes than a series of political events.

When I was an undergraduate I had very badly annotated editions of Shakespeare's sonnets, all of which left out the important fact that will has a sexual sense in Shakespeare's sonnets.

I'm sure if Shakespeare were alive today, he'd be doing classic guitar solos on YouTube.

The way Shakespeare wrote Fallstaff is with a heightened language and everything.

I am a huge admirer of Elizabeth I, and this intriguing biography gives a wonderful picture of the era.

Anne Boleyn is certainly the most exciting character I have played on stage.

I had great English teachers in high school who first piqued my interest in Shakespeare. Each year, we read a different play - 'Othello,' 'Julius Caesar,' 'Macbeth,' 'Hamlet' - and I was the nerd in class who would memorize soliloquies just for the fun of it.

I studied Shakespeare all through high school. Both of my parents teach English and history, so it has always been around my experience as a young man.

Elizabeth I was my favourite monarch though, what an inspiration, she did great things for women.

I think that the benefit of playing someone like Queen Elizabeth is that so much has been written about her, and there's so much speculation about her - was she a hermaphrodite? She's so mythologised, and there are a lot of images of her.

In fact I'd like to go back and live in Shakespeare's London.

There is hardly a pioneer's hut which does not contain a few odd volumes of Shakespeare. I remember reading the feudal drama of Henry V for the first time in a log cabin.

I think the height of ridiculousness was when I was playing Elizabeth in 'The Golden Age' while preparing to start shooting 'I'm Not There.' I literally finished filming Elizabethan grandeur on Friday, flew to Montreal, and started being Bob Dylan on Monday.

At my school, Shakespeare wasn't on the syllabus - at least not for me.

Shakespeare's always on my dance card if it can be.

Shakespeare is a permanent presence in the English letters.

If Shakespeare was around today I would ask him out to dinner. The only thing I don't like about him is the way he did his hair.

I love the Shakespeare history plays; I love the struggle for the crown as a plot.

Shakespeare set a lot of his dramas in a historical perspective or war perspective, or he would study what was going on at that time.

Our understanding of Shakespeare already depends largely on the vitality of Renaissance elements in our education. Each man must live in his own generation, as the saying is; but the generations are bound together by the golden links of the great tradition of civilization.

We have far too many Tudors. Henry VIII is far too over-rated. He's become the ultimate brand name, like the Marks & Spencers of a high street of British history. I'm more interested in King Herod.

My earliest influence was Shakespeare - I read Shakespeare incessantly as a kid.