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Prayer et apocarpe Prayers of Thomas More
In April 1534, Thomas More was arrested and taken to the Tower of London where he was kept until 6th July 1535 to be taken to Tower Hill and beheaded.
During his long stay in the Tower, his living conditions evolved towards less and less comfort. The initial aim of his imprisonment was to allow him enough time to review his moral and christian positions and come to terms with Henry VIII's wish to divorce Catherine of Aragon and proclaim himself the Head of the Church of England.
In those days, it was possible for More to express himself and he took adavantage of these conditions, writing a number of texts known as his Prison Writings.
Before they took his books from him, More had kept his prayer book. This is where that famous prayer of his was discovered, hand-written in the margins.
That prayer was often misquoted, parodied and imitated, and a number of pleasant apocryphal versions were disseminated, translated into many languages.
These acrocryphal versions came to be remembered better than the original, hence Pope Francis's 2015 quotation. However, given the humorous character of Thomas More, we think he would have loved to see his text thus altered and appreciated by so many. |
Here are the various articles published in Moreana since 1963. Please find the article references plus the PDF file of the article to be downloaded. The article can also be found on www.proquest.com. |
Moreana Vol.1, No.4 - November 1964, p44-45 - Germain Marc'hadour
This first article présents two apocryphal versions and announces the longer article on Thomas More's real prayer.
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Moreana Vol.2, No.5 - February 1965, p53-72 - Germain Marc'hadour
"A godly meditation in More's own hand (with facsimile). Prayer written in prison: Give me thy grace... " |
Moreana Vol.4, No.13 - February 1967, p45-52
A prayer of St Thomas More's in Welsh (1587) |
Moreana Vol.7, No.27-28 - December 1970, p13 - Emile Roumer & Mme Marcel Gauvin
Thomas More's Prayer in Haiti Creole. |
Moreana Vol.9, No.36 - December 1972, p93-96 - Thomas Webb
"Give me a good digestion, Lord" - More's apocryphal prayer. |
Moreana Vol.13, No.49 - February 1976, p51-52 - Fernando de Mello Moser
More's spurious prayer (Portuguese version). |
Gazette No.79-80 - November 1983, p191-196 - Various translations and ORIGIN of the APOCRYPHAL prayer.
Esperanto - Italian - Hungarian - Portuguese. |
Gazette No.98-99 - December 1988, p228
One more apocryphal prayer! |
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