Thomas

by Shelley Mydans

'It is very rare that an historical novelist can illuminate an epoch as precisely as the professional historian, yet Mrs. Mydans has achieved this. There are few more fascinating and dramatic conflicts in history than that between Henry II and Thomas Becket. She is able to re-create the development of Becket's character while anchoring herself to an orthodox chronological narrative. The book is well balanced, and there is tension throughout between the miracle-working Becket of medieval hagiography and the actual Becket of concrete historical fact. Mrs. Mydans has not only written a good novel but also made a useful contribution to historical understanding.'
TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT

Genres: Historical Fiction, Fiction

405 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published January 1, 1965

About the author

Shelley Smith Mydans was born in Palo Alto, Calif., the daughter of a professor of journalism at Stanford University.

Mydans was the author of three novels and co-author of a nonfiction book. She and her husband were Life magazine's first photographer-reporter team to cover the war.

After attending Stanford, she worked briefly for The Literary Digest and then joined the staff of Life magazine as a researcher-reporter. She met Carl Mydans, a Life photographer, and they were married in 1938. In 1939 they were sent together to Europe. They stayed until the fall of France and then were sent to Chongqing, China, to report on the Sino-Japanese war and, after that, to the Western Pacific.

At the time of the attacks on Pearl Harbor and the Philippines, they were based in Manila and were taken prisoner when Japanese forces arrived. After nearly two years in captivity, they were returned to the United States in a prisoner exchange. Mrs. Mydans's first novel, The Open City, published in 1945, was based on the experiences of Americans captured by the Japanese.

After their release, she and her husband both returned to the Philippines. At the end of the war she moved to New York, becoming a commentator for a Time Inc. radio news program and writing for Time and Life; when Mr. Mydans was bureau chief for Time and Life in Tokyo, she also reported from there.

Her other books were Thomas, The Vermilion Bridge, and The Violent Peace,

Reviews

[Checkman · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read this novel when I was in the Army. I was on a fifteen day field problem (training exercise) back in the summer of 98 and I was a driver for a lieutenant colonel. I knew that my schedule would consist of many hours of hurry up and wait so there would be chances for reading. I took it as an opportunity to take out books that I had always had on my to-read list, but always found excuses not to read. Thomas a Novel of the Life Passions and Miracles of Becket was one of them. I'm an amateur historian and I was curious to see what Mrs. Mydans would do with the controversial Thomas Becket. I was especially curious since I was reading a paperback edition put out by a Catholic printing house.

Instead of a piece of Catholic propaganda I discovered a fairly balanced treatment of Becket and Henry II. Becket is not portrayed as an infallible, saintly man. He is shown as being intelligent, ambitious, a politician, and a man of the world for much of his existence. Henry is ruthless, also intelligent, cunning and very competent. He understands that his power had limitations and war is very often counter-productive. He does not tolerate disloyalty and in some respect you, the reader, can sympathize with Henry's anger over Becket's betrayal.

Mydans shows Becket experiencing a religious conversion of sorts, but there are no supernatural elements. It's all Becket and it's up to the reader to decide how truthful Becket was being to himself and others.

All in all a pretty good read. Reminds me of the works of Frank G. Slaughter and
Howard Fast. An intelligent mainstream novel that is both entertaining and thought provoking.

[Louie (mary-louise) · Rating 5 out of 5]

My father gave me this book back in 1970 when I was in high school - it took me a few times to really get into it, but after getting past the first 50 pages I found I could not put it down. Right now I am reading Wolf Hall, by Hilary Mantel, and I find that Mantel's writing style is very similar to Shelley Mydans. Very personal and Intimate - gets inside the protagonist's head. Just like Thomas Cromwell in Wolf Hall, Thomas a Becket was a controversial character in European history. Mydans makes Becket a living, breathing human and helps the reader understand the choices he made that led to his murder.

[Margareth8537 · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read this while studying Becket at school. More palatable than some of the stuff I was having to read, and seemed to keep to the facts.
The Becket that is portrayed is a politician and courtier, and his relationship with the King is well portrayed

[Gene · Rating 2 out of 5]

I was hoping to be somewhat inspired by the life of Thomas Beckett, but I wasn't. Of course this is not all the fault of the author of this historical novel - it is partly because this martyr lived a life not fully virtuous or worthy of imitation. Nevertheless, the novel seemed to focus so much on the politics of the time that I found it somewhat uninteresting. One does get a glimpse of this saint's struggle to become humble, but somehow that aspect is not dealt with in a way that the reader can feel he is participating in the conflict or cheering him on.

I felt the side story of the minter of coins was more of a source of distraction and confusion than enlightenment. Many of the early pages dealt with Henry the 2nd's wife, but it ends up not really impacting Thomas' life very directly. In some ways I think the author should have been less a historical novelist and more of a novelist. After reading Thomas Mann's long novel about Joseph of the Old Testament, this novel was up against serious competition in my mind for this genre.

The book was much longer than I thought when I picked it off my shelf because it has extremely thin and light pages. Given the thickness, I expected it to be about half as long as it really was! I've not come across such thin pages outside of a Bible or airmail stationery before.

Worth reading, but not inspiring or memorable.

[Peter Burton · Rating 4 out of 5]

A well known story to lovers of history so there’s no surprising twist to the tale.It is however a detailed attempt to understand the enigma of Becket and the events surrounding his murder.And a good story it is too.Lowly born, seen by many as a youth of promise until he becomes the friend and advisor to Henry II.However once he becomes the Archbishop of Canterbury he thwarts the king’s attempts to make royal justice the supreme law of England and endures countless humiliations and eventual death.Shelley describes his conflicting emotions and ideas and the king’s responses making it a credible account of a vital development in English history and law.Becket was destined to fail and rightly too but his death was possibly avoidable but for 4 knights misinterpreting the king’s outbursts.This is a long story and possibly not to modern tastes but it is well worth a read if an old copy can be found, especially to lovers of historical issues.

[Rachel Rothwell · Rating 4 out of 5]

Vaery entertaining novel of Thomas Becket rise and fall.