The Secret Diaries of Juan Luis Vives
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“Ellis writes … with magnificent gusto … reminiscent of Hilary Mantel’s Wolf Hall … a fast-paced and richly engaging story.”
— Kirkus Reviews
“Beautiful metaphors and tactile, evocative descriptions bring sixteenth-century England and Spain to life.”
— Foreword Reviews
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Juan Luis Vives
“I was to play the clever little fish. And if my quest sounds abhorrent to you, my diary, remember that there is no greater abhorrence than the flames I saw in Valencia and the fears that haunt my people day by day.”
The year is 1522; the place, Bruges — the Spanish Netherlands. Juan Luis Vives, a Jewish academic, has fled the Spanish Inquisition, leaving behind his father and three sisters. A humanist, he speaks to his students of tolerance, peace and equality, emphasizing “the duty of all to repair the world.” In The Secret Diaries of Juan Luis Vives, author Tim Darcy Ellis resurrects this historical figure through imagined personal writings that capture a man who was truly ahead of his time.
Sir Thomas More
After grabbing the attention of Sir Thomas More, Vives is offered the chance to move to England and become tutor to Mary, daughter of Henry VIII and Catherine of Aragon. Seeing this as an opportunity to shape the young mind of a future ruler and secure the favor of both England’s King and his wife — the daughter of King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella of Spain, the architects of the very Inquisition he has fled — Vives eagerly accepts. But when he arrives in England, he realizes finding a home and a safe haven for his people will be more difficult than he first imagined.
Despite authoring Utopia just three years before Vives’s arrival, Sir Thomas More is less inclined to speak on tolerance and equality than Vives would have hoped. In fact, he seems disillusioned by such ideas altogether. Mary, the young princess and his student, has already been indoctrinated by the Catholic Church and her grandparents’ legacy, and Vives knows that “if she couldn’t see the true beauty of creation and how it resonated with God, she would be a dangerous monarch.”
Catherine of Aragon
Even more dangerous is the tightrope he’s walking between Henry and Catherine. On one end, the queen, fearful of losing her throne, has promised to assist Vives in bringing his family to England, where they’ll be safe from the fires of the Inquisition, if he’ll swear his allegiance to her and support Rome’s declaration of her marriage’s legitimacy. On the other end, the king, who desires male heirs and the bewitching Anne Boleyn, asks Vives to find some biblical precedent that would allow for the annulment of his marriage to Catherine. If he supports the king, Vives is guaranteed safety in England, a safety that Henry says will extend to all Jews in time.
Henry VIII
Torn between the safety of his family and the prosperity of his people, Vives’s head is “a storm of conflicting thoughts and misplaced loyalties.” He knows that one wrong step means he’ll lose his footing in the Tudor court, likely costing him his life. Constantly looking over his shoulder and never knowing who he can trust, Vives turns to his diary as a means of confession and comfort.
Ellis writes Vives’s diary with all the raw emotion you’d expect from a man who has spent his life running from powerful forces that would see him dead but is wise enough to know that even if “it’s a cruel world, the only way to change it is to stay in it.” Ellis’s translation of Vives onto the page captures the fear, conflict, determination and joy of his story, leaving the reader eager to turn the page and wondering Why didn’t I know the name Juan Luis Vives before now?
Visit Tim Darcy Ellis’s BookTrib author profile page and check out our interview with him here.
