The Life of Cardinal Wolsey is George Cavendish’s celebrated biography of Thomas Wolsey, the butcher’s son who rose to become Lord Chancellor and the most powerful minister of Henry VIII. Written by a man who served in Wolsey’s household, it is one of the great early works of English biography and an intimate eyewitness account of Tudor court politics.
Cavendish traces Wolsey’s dazzling ascent, his magnificence at Hampton Court, and his sudden fall when he failed to secure the king’s divorce from Catherine of Aragon. The portrait of greatness undone by royal displeasure has moved readers for centuries and shaped later depictions of the Tudor age. This free EPUB download preserves the full classic text.