ONE of the oldest women to be beheaded on the orders of Henry VIII is the subject of a sequence of poems in a pamphlet produced by a student at Leeds Trinity University.

Lady Margaret Pole was an English peeress who is believed to have been in her late 60s when she was executed.

Now her life is examined in poems written by Phd student Edwin Stockdale.

Edwin researched and wrote the sequence for his Masters in Creative Writing - The Glower of the Sun - at the University of Birmingham.

He said: “I chose this topic because I found Lady Margaret Pole a fascinating figure. She was one of only two women in the sixteenth century who was made a countess in her own right. Her life was one of violence and shifting fortunes. What I most enjoyed writing about was filling in the gaps of her story to access the small, intimate, personal moments of history.”

As well as the poems about Lady Margaret, Edwin’s pamphlet also includes pieces about Mary Shelley and Lady Jane Grey. He is currently researching Richard III and the Princes in the Tower for his PhD and is writing a new poetry collection about them, which has already been accepted for publication.

In an endorsement of The Glower of the Sun Luke Kennard, Senior Lecturer in Creative Writing at the University of Birmingham and award-winning poet and novelist, wrote: “A powerful collection culminates in The Passion of Lady Margaret Pole, a sequence of heart-breaking tenderness and historical insight, bringing the often-overlooked Countess to imagistic life. An unmissable new pamphlet from one of the country’s most promising talents.”

The Glower of the Sun is available for £6 from Red Squirrel Press.