The King's Painter

The Life and Times of Hans Holbein

By: Franny Moyle

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Paperback | 29 July 2025

At a Glance

Format
Paperback

Dimensions(cm)
19.8 x 12.9 x 3.4

Paperback

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A BBC RADIO 4 BOOK OF THE WEEK

'A great, thrusting codpiece of a book. It is big, bombastic and richly brocaded... A jewel in its own right' The Times

'Evokes the painter and his world as vividly as a Holbein masterpiece. Beautifully written and illustrated, this book is a must for lovers of Tudor history' Tracy Borman

'Full of insight... This is a gorgeous book, to which I am sure I shall return again and again' Dan Jones

Hans Holbein the Younger is chiefly celebrated for his beautiful and precisely realised portraiture, which includes representations of Henry VIII, Thomas More, Thomas Cromwell, Anne of Cleves, Jane Seymour and an array of the Tudor lords and ladies he encountered during the course of two sojourns in England. But beyond these familiar images, which have come to define our perception of the world of the Henrician court, Holbein was a protean and multi-faceted genius: a humanist, satirist, political propagandist, and contributor to the history of book design as well as a religious artist and court painter. The rich layers of symbolism and allusion that characterise his work have proved especially fascinating to scholars.

Franny Moyle traces and analyses the life and work of an extraordinary artist against the backdrop of an era of political turbulence and cultural transformation, to which his art offers a subtle and endlessly refracting mirror.

About the Author

Franny Moyle is a British television producer and author. Her first book Desperate Romantics was adapted into the BBC drama serial of the same title by screenwriter Peter Bowker. Her second book Constance: The Tragic and Scandalous Life of Mrs Oscar Wilde was published in 2011 to critical acclaim. In 2016 she released The Extraordinary Life and Times of J.M.W Turner.

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