Heretics and Believers: A History of the English Reformation

Centuries on, what the Reformation was and what it accomplished remain deeply contentious. Peter Marshall's sweeping new history argues that sixteenth-century England was a society neither desperate for nor allergic to change, but one open to ideas of "reform" in various competing guises. King Henry VIII wanted an orderly, uniform Reformation, but his actions opened a Pandora's Box from which pluralism and diversity flowed and rooted themselves in English life.



With sensitivity to individua...