I think the fact they managed to live to their mid thirties is reasonable historical proof they weren't as vulnerable as Mantel suggests. That and their success in politics.
I tend to agree with your assessments of what makes for interesting characters and literary quality in historical novels, but I also tend to look at it from a different angle.
I suppose it's a whole other problem that people get their history from a novel, but since, realistically speaking, even the best intentioned people can't be expected to do research on every historical time period they might chance to read a novel on, I think historical novelists have some responsibility toward their readers when it comes to accuracy. What do I mean by accuracy? Just be conscientious, be honest with your readers about what you're doing. It's not that complicated, really. I happen to think the best historical novels are the ones in which the author imagines based on available facts, what living in a different period was like, why a given personage might have believed the things s/he believed, made the decisions s/he made, etc. But I'm willing to acknowledge that may be little more than my personal preference.
So, really, a novelist can write whatever s/he wants, but honestly, I think historical novelists owe it to their readers to provide an author's note pointing out the major deviations from the historical record or at least acknowledge their approach to the history they're dealing with, rather than offering the kind of glib condescension of Mantel's preface. And that goes double when they're styling themselves the resident historical expert on literary reviews as Mantel does.
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That and their success in politics.
I tend to agree with your assessments of what makes for interesting characters and literary quality in historical novels, but I also tend to look at it from a different angle.
I suppose it's a whole other problem that people get their history from a novel, but since, realistically speaking, even the best intentioned people can't be expected to do research on every historical time period they might chance to read a novel on, I think historical novelists have some responsibility toward their readers when it comes to accuracy. What do I mean by accuracy? Just be conscientious, be honest with your readers about what you're doing. It's not that complicated, really. I happen to think the best historical novels are the ones in which the author imagines based on available facts, what living in a different period was like, why a given personage might have believed the things s/he believed, made the decisions s/he made, etc. But I'm willing to acknowledge that may be little more than my personal preference.
So, really, a novelist can write whatever s/he wants, but honestly, I think historical novelists owe it to their readers to provide an author's note pointing out the major deviations from the historical record or at least acknowledge their approach to the history they're dealing with, rather than offering the kind of glib condescension of Mantel's preface. And that goes double when they're styling themselves the resident historical expert on literary reviews as Mantel does.