Beyond the Diana fairytale, the Royals endure
Twenty years after Diana died, the royals endure.
Prince Harry was asked last week to reflect on the death of his mother, Diana, who died 20 years ago today. One of the main things he remembered, he said, was how people’s hands were wet from the tears they had just wiped away.
Tears from strangers.
That is what lingers in Harry’s mind but what about the rest of us? What do we remember about the life and death of the woman who was once the Princess of Wales?
We know more than we knew then. We know the marriage was no fairytale. We are no longer so naive.
Diana Spencer was sometimes described as a commoner, and that is strictly true. She was not born royal but she was Lady Diana Spencer, and therefore a child of the aristocracy. Her father was Viscount Althorp, and both of her grandmothers had served as ladies-in-waiting to Queen Elizabeth, the queen mother. As a child, she was instructed by a governess before being sent to a private school, where she proved no mental giant, failing her O Levels not once but twice. Then came finishing school in Switzerland, and a term of employment as a kindergarten aide before her engagement, at 19, to the future king of England.
In a now-famous interview ahead of their nuptials, Charles and Diana were asked if they were in love. With her blonde head tilted, Diana said: “Of course.”
Charles said: “Whatever ‘in love’ means.”
And there it was: the first fissure in the princess bride fairytale, not even hiding but in plain sight for anyone to see, except we — the enchanted — did not want to see it. Better to gaze in wonder at the wedding ceremony, which came with every conceivable princess appurtenance, from the tiara upon Diana’s head to footmen on the carriage. Then, at the altar, she got his name wrong.
Is it cruel to suggest that Diana on of her wedding day — July 29, 1981 — seemed not only shy but incomplete? Although by now 20 — still young but not in an improper way — there looked sometimes to be not a single thought in her head.
Also, were they ever really married? Not if marriage means what we think it means: loyalty, fidelity, duty to one’s spouse. The couple had two children — William and Henry, known as Harry — but Charles did not love Diana, and he was not faithful to her, and neither was she to him in the end. The union collapsed in an ugly way.
Adultery. Betrayal. Divorce.
The couple separated in 1992, and here the story becomes a little more interesting, for instead of taking only whatever cash was on offer, Diana — with the assistance of an eager British press and plenty of PR — began remaking her image. She wore flattering dresses and posed for paparazzi. She visited the sick, embraced the dying and toured landmine sites, wearing an armoured vest inscribed with “the HALO Trust” and heavily laden eyelashes.
In the battle to be the most fun parent, before and after the divorce, Diana was the hands-on and hands-down winner, playing peek-a-boo on official engagements, running barefoot in the parent races at the boys’ school and getting soaked with them on carnival rides. But they were young and would be forever royal, and in the long term she would have lost.
There was no long term, for in 1997 — 20 years ago today — Diana was killed in a car accident in Paris along with her lover, millionaire Dodi al-Fayed, whose family owned Harrods. Clocks may not have stopped but millions of people came to a halt for the funeral. Having been rock-solid through two world wars, the abdication of a king and the bombing of London, the British people found themselves affected, and tears came pouring over stiff upper lips on to young Harry’s hands. Their grief translated, too, into the mawkish tributes, among them the blanket of petrol station flowers in cellophane, and Elton John singing a reworked version of Candle in the Wind.
Then came the prime minister’s speech in the rain, with Tony Blair blubbering about how Diana was the “people’s princess who will live in our hearts for ever and ever” and a splendid eulogy by a furious Earl Spencer — Diana’s brother Charles — who let fly at the perceived coldness of the palace.
“I pledge that we, your blood family, will do all we can to continue the imaginative way in which you were steering these two exceptional young men,” he said of Diana’s sons, so they might continue in their royal duties but also “sing as openly as you planned”.
Diana’s sudden, violent death plunged the monarchy into a crisis that was not existential — given the history of kings and queens in England, that would be taking things too far — but for a moment it seemed that she would in repose become larger and more disruptive than she had been in life.
It has not happened, and much credit is due the Queen — the indomitable, inscrutable Queen — who remained resolute. But it has also been Diana’s sons, those lovely young men, who have provided the balm. It’s the little things they do to warm the public, such as the name that William and Kate gave their daughter, Charlotte Elizabeth Diana, and Kate emerging from the maternity hospital in a blue smock, like Diana’s; or the wedding dress she chose, with its nod to the old-fashioned values, of modesty, and service. She barely speaks. Have you noticed that?
Both men — William is now 35, and Harry 32 — have spoken movingly in recent weeks about the impact of their mother’s death. In a new BBC documentary to commemorate the anniversary, William said that walking behind Diana’s coffin was “the hardest thing I’ve ever done. It felt she was almost walking along beside us to get us through it.”
Harry has criticised his family — the royal family — saying: “I don’t think any child should be asked to do that under any circumstances. I don’t think it would happen today.” He has confessed also to being “very close to a complete breakdown on numerous occasions” and of seeking counselling.
William was determined that the death of his mother when he was just 15 would not “break me, it would make me”. He wanted her, and still wants her, to be “proud of the person I would become”.
Years ago, reporters in Sydney witnessed a remarkable moment when William, touring this country on his own for the first time, spotted a fan in the crowd holding a photograph of Diana and her first-born, taken during her own first visit to Australia.
“Is that me?” William said, and the woman told him that it was, and that she’d never forgotten how Diana had insisted on bringing William to Australia, for she so loved her little son and did not want him raised alone by nannies. William seemed so pleased. It is clear that he adored her.
Harry, too, is a regular visitor to these shores. He has carved a special place for himself as the larrikin son of the monarchy, an irrepressible spirit, whose commitment to public service, and the cause of wounded servicemen, through the charity known as Soldier On, has not gone unnoticed.
They have grown up, and she would be proud.
As for the changes so many wished to see, well, the monarchy has changed a little: a girl can now inherit the throne if she is first born, and it seems William was permitted to make a love match. Charles, too, has won permission to marry his mistress, although it remains to be seen whether Camilla will become Queen.
And Diana? It’s a curious place that she occupies, at once so alive in our memory yet moving, inexorably, into our past, so much so that the temptation is to reach back and drag her forward, saying: “Come on, Diana! Keep up!” But of course she can’t. Diana is buried on a private island surrounded by a lake on the Althorp estate, home of the Spencer family since 1508.
For those who are perhaps wondering what the palace will do to commemorate Diana’s death, the answer is nothing. Her sons have commissioned a statue, but it is not yet complete. Diana’s writing desk is on display at Buckingham Place, with some ballet shoes and a cassette tape with music by George Michael, but no formal public event is scheduled.
The moment, that seismic moment when the British people relieved themselves of their traditional restraints and wept in the streets, has passed. The House of Windsor did not fall. The monarchy endures.
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