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Even for committed Republicans, or maybe that should be, especially for committed Republicans, there is nothing quite like some good Royal gossip.
And the most recent Royal biography, a memoir of Prince Charles titled “Rebel Prince” by Tom Bower, contains big, silver tureens-full of it.
Bower paints Charles as petulant, self-pitying and spoiled, and claims he has led a life so sheltered he didn’t learn what cling-film was until he accidentally saw it covering his dinner when he was well in his 50s.
There are other anecdotes about Charles which are equally damning, and so thrilling it’s hard to care too much if they’re true.
Bower claims the prince once took his own bed, toilet seat and toilet paper when he was visiting a friend in the countryside, along with two of his favourite paintings, to adorn the walls of his guest room.
Bower writes that Charles is obsessed with public opinion and worried that the public would blame him after Princess Diana’s death.
The author also claims he has his gardeners hand-pull every single weed from his extensive gardens, because he refuses to use pesticides.
Bower claims to have interviewed about 120 people for the book, and for my money the anecdotes in the book that ring most true are the ones involving the Queen.
Elizabeth II is no fan of her second daughter-in-law, the former Camilla Parker Bowles-turned-Duchess of Cornwall, referring to her as “that wicked woman”.
She refused to acknowledge Camilla for as long as possible, well after Charles and Diana’s divorce.
Her Maj considered Camilla vulgar and disliked her for not leaving Charles alone to try to mend his marriage with Diana, according to the book.
When Charles and Camilla eventually married, the Queen made her disdain evident by deploying the greatest power-move in her aristocratic, protocol-laden arsenal: as soon as the ceremony finished she snuck off to a side-room to watch the Grand National horse race with her new daughter-in-law’s ex-husband, Andrew Parker Bowles.
When the Queen entered the wedding reception, the first announcement she made was the winner of the race.
In short, The Queen is a total boss. She may be restricted by protocol, hundreds of years of tradition and the heavy weight of responsibility for country and empire, but she still finds a way to make her feelings known.
Much to the reported dismay of her son and heir, she refuses to abdicate and make way for him.
No other public figure or head of state is comparable to her in longevity or sheer grit, and it’s impossible to think of anyone who has devoted themselves more, or for a longer period, to public duty, and yet the public knows next to nothing about what she really thinks about anything.
As the Royal family is rejuvenated and modernised by two young women – Kate Middleton and Meghan Markle – who have no aristocratic lineage or royal blood, it is worth remembering the original strong female royal.
It may be pushing it to call her a feminist icon.
But the Queen has out-lasted, out-witted and out-classed a lot of blokes, including her own son.
RELATED: Here’s Definitive Proof The Queen Has Binge-Watched The Crown
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