MBTI Type: ESTP

Henry is a present-minded, lusty king who focuses on having experiences – he hunts boars, he jousts, he competes, he dances, he sees a beautiful woman and expects to have her in his bed by sundown, much to the amusement of his male courtiers and the annoyance of his pious wife. Once he sets his sights on Anne, it drives him to distraction that she rebuts all his attempts to seduce, coerce, or just plain “have” her (but not against her will), even as he hastily manipulates events in his favor in the moment – by banishing her from Percy’s side, sending her into the country where he can woo her, bringing her to court so she must see him every day, and even deciding to break with Rome for the right to marry her. He does so in the hopes of quick gratification, but always with an eye on the future (he wants to “fill her up with sons,” heirs to vindicate his divorce / annulment and excommunication, and rather than think about his death as damning him for his break from the Church, he seeks to place his faith in his own divinity as a king whom “God answers” instead). His decisions are all tactical and he believes in his own truths, even when outside forces contradict him. He is firmly convinced that Katharine and his marriage was coerced (“Spain and England married each other, we did not!”) and that God is punishing him for laying with his brother’s wife (“He has taken our sons!” he tells her, to which she reminds him she bore a healthy, living daughter; this, he scoffs at, because only boys matter in the line of succession). Henry wields and uses his power easily and is not above rational but immoral subterfuge, trickery, manipulation, and emotional blackmail. His tert-Fe feels insulted at being “refused by a maid,” and tries to seduce her with pretty words, and emotional tactics (how he thinks of no one but her, how she drives him mad, etc) – all the while, he asks his courtiers and friends for tips on how to seduce a woman and convince her of his love, which he at times does not feel. Henry is deeply uncomfortable with genuine emotional outbursts – he does not want to tell Katharine about the annulment himself, and struggles to cope with her breakdown into angry tears. He takes Anne’s fierce rejections personally, but is also somewhat callous at the end of her life, and asks her to convince him she did not commit adultery.

Enneagram: 8w7 sx/so

Henry has a ferocious lust for life and sees no reason to deny himself; in 8ish fashion, he goes directly for what he wants and makes his intentions known – he has no further interest in Mary Boleyn, and wants her sister instead. Any attempts to control her come to a bad end; as a fellow 8 herself, she defies, challenges, and insults him to his face in a way that shocks him, but that he grows to respect. He has a bullish temper that in one scene, he unleashes to slap her hard enough, it knocks her to the floor. Under the stress of her trial, Henry becomes more reclusive, self-doubting, and distrustful (moving to 5). His 7 wing refuses to take personal responsibility for his mistakes, lying about and denying his own decisions that have now caused him grief. (Though he tells Anne he and Katharine meant nothing to one another, actually, he chose to marry her and was deeply in love with her at that time.) He seeks pleasure, distractions, and entertainments to avoid the pain of his self-doubt as regards his marriage, and to assuage his miseries at being without a son.