Dear Bernard Cornwell,
Having just finished reading War Lord I want to take this opportunity to thank you for yet another really captivating read and for bringing Uhtred’s story to a most satisfying and appropriate conclusion. This really leads me to express my gratitude to you for sixteen years of hugely enjoying your Last Kingdom series of novels, each of which I have bought as soon as I was aware that they had been published. It has been a truly enjoyable saga forging its way through some eight decades of Anglo-Saxon history. A period I find particularly appealing for reasons that are apparently very similar to your own.
As it happens, for a brief period of our lives we trod similar paths. Despite both of us being late February babies, I am actually two years your junior which meant that you were two years ahead of me at Monkton Combe, where I do actually have a hazy memory of you. If websites are to be believed, you preceded me to Marjons in Chelsea from where I graduated in 1969. I don’t think our paths crossed unless you had to avoid me on my motorbike at some point! However it is at Marjons that I had a similar damascene moment to you. In the Conversation section at the end of War Lord your explanation for the birth of your interest in the Anglo-Saxons is literally identical to my own. Initial irritation at being obliged to learn Anglo-Saxon for my English studies grew into a total fascination with the period. Latin lessons focused on Gaul and the Romans. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle mentioned Reading, Winchester and familiar places just down the road! I was hooked and have been ever since. One bookcase is dedicated to the period, so as you might imagine, when you launched your Uhtred series it was right on target.
So thank you again for all the enjoyment you have given me during these years. If Uhtred wasn’t real, well he should have been!
With every best wish for Christmas and for 2021 (let’s hope it is healthier and rather less fraught).
Jim MacFarlane