Maria Laura Avignolo
07/25/2020 - 15:46
- Clarín.com
- Society
The dysfunctionality of the British Royal Family, its envy, the jealousy and betrayal of the different palaces, its intrigues, resentment and cartel problems between Prince Charles, his son William and his brother Harry and the rejection of the first royal mestizo of their history . All these were the reasons for Meghan Markle and Prince Harry, the Dukes of Sussex, to adopt the unprecedented public decision to leave the Windsor House and finally move to Canada and the United States, in an obstacle course to prevent them.
His version of the story is told in a preview of the book "Finding Freedom" , written by the royal correspondent Omid Scobie and the American Carolyn Durand, whose first three chapters were advanced this Saturday by the British newspaper The Times and Sunday by The Sunday Times. A serious blow to the image of the Royals because the tragic story of Princess Diana, her battle against the courtly "gray men" that slowed her down, her inability to access Queen Elizabeth, is repeated. This time with her own son, the sovereign's favorite. Its protagonists have not changed. Only one adds: Meghan, the first mixed duchess of the Royal Family.
These two journalists, who know the corridors of Buckingham and its protagonists, are as specialized as they are atypical. Scobie is a Brit, educated in one of the best private schools in the country, with a wealthy Scottish farmer father and an Iranian mother, who knows about the problems of racism in the kingdom. Carolyn lived 15 years in London and worked for NBC. She covered the Royal Family with American eyes and triple source checks. According to them, there was no interview on and off the record with the Sussex, but it is obvious that they accessed their most intimate environment . They accuse them of being pro Meghan in this battle of protagonisms and visions.
Harry and Meghan, at an official activity in London. (Reuters)
The internal fight and suspicion against the Sussexs and their plans were such that the couple was blocked by courtiers from Prince Charles' office from seeing the Queen, who lives less than 1,000 meters from their home in Frogmore Cottage, or in Windsor Palace. They felt so bad and so helpless that, on the plane that brought them from Air Canada to negotiate their departure from the Royal House, they planned to go directly to Buckingham Palace from the airport to see their grandmother without warning .
The role of gray men
The "gray men" - as Princess Diana called those who control the Royals' lives, audiences, movements, and correspondence - feared that Meghan and Harry's initial popularity and profile would "overshadow" Queen Elizabeth by Prince Charles and William and Kate, their successors. Although they recognized that they were taking "the monarchy to new heights around the world ".
Meghan, actress, multilingual, North American, mixed race, graduated in communication and international relations, was not seen as a window to show a renewed, modern Royal Family, in its relationship with minorities. The courtiers looked at her with racism and prejudice. They did not understand their habits, they could not bear their California habit of getting up at five in the morning to meditate and do yoga, and they hated receiving messages at dawn from the early morning duchess. Much less her accent.
Family in crisis. Carlos, his sons and daughters-in-law, in the last official Sussex activity in London. (AFP)
The book is an x-ray of the new Windsor House conflict with its two most popular members, closest to the people, and the rest of its members. It reveals step by step how the Sussex, cornered, exhausted, at the same time fearful, are taking the decision that the best they can do is leave the Royal Family and leave the country. A resolution that supports more Harry than Meghan. She, a university student, abandoned her acting career, her life in Canada and her series "Suites" to dedicate her life to a family that treated her as a third category character and blocked her appearances to privilege those of Prince Carlos and Camilla, those of William and Kate, in a respect to the hierarchy of the line of succession .
Harry had lived through this battle with his mother, Diana. He had seen and heard her cry before the humiliations of the palace and her father, Prince Charles. He had promised her that he was not going to repeat history, that he was going to be free. He was only 11 years old when she died, but his tragedy marked his life and his decisions. From her he learned the need to choose and live with joy, as normal as possible, without being caught by the “golden aviary”, as he called it. When he left the army, subjected to a huge depression, he also thought about leaving the Royal Family and its obligations . He preferred to be Captain Wales, he was happier. In Meghan he found an ally to make this decision.
Probably the biggest scare for the palace's archaic communicators, who had still rescued the Royal Family from the fall in the face of public opinion after Diana's death, was the Sussex decision to "be in control of their narrative "
Meghan with her son Archie. (Instagram)
This meant maintaining his own agenda , on his own terms. Just like Kate, the Duchess of Cambridge is still afraid to speak in public ten years after her first time, Meghan began to speak, without written speech, two weeks after being Duchess, quite naturally. She is a professional calligrapher and knows how to write her own texts. She had to hide her projects like going to help the residents of the Greenfold Tower fire in Kensington, who were ethnically minority, and make a cookbook with them, or be the editor-in-chief of Vogue, in full motherhood. All projects that the palace learned about after the fact because they had never allowed it.
Jealousy, leaks and racism
Meghan and Harry began to occupy pages of the diaries at the expense of Camilla and Charles and Kate and William, who were furious with jealousy . This is how palace envy works in the courts. Their image is built not by what they say - they rarely speak - but where they go or what they do. And it is hierarchical .
Harry and Meghan lived in a two-bedroom cottage in Kensington Palace, a legacy from when he was single. They were preparing a larger apartment for them in Kensington Palace itself when Harry asked his grandmother to live in Windsor, far from London. Thus was born the project to remodel Frogmore Cottage.
The bond between the two brothers had deteriorated since William warned his brother about the speed of marrying Meghan. Harry took it very badly.
Thus was born the decision to divide the court that the two brothers kept together in Kensington Palace and that organized their agendas. The Sussexs wanted to keep their own court in Windsor, with their people. But they were told that they must work under the umbrella of Buckingham Palace, which would synchronize their movements. A decision of Prince Charles.
Harry promised himself that neither he nor his wife would go through the same nightmare that his mother, Lady Di, lived through. (AP)
It was the beginning of hell , of procrastination. ”The great disappointment for them. As their popularity grew, so did Harry and Meghan's difficulties in understanding why so few in the palace cared about their interests. They were the great attraction for the Royal Family. But they made them sit in the back seat. Many times they were told that their projects should wait when Prince Charles or Prince William had an initiative or a trip had been announced at the same time, "according to the book.
They protested, tried to convince them, they met with the queen and Prince Charles. But they felt that their complaints were going nowhere. Then there was mistrust . "There was only a small group of people in the palace that they could trust." A friend of the couple called the old palatial guard "the vipers." A source in the palace called the Sussexs "the third screeching wheel" of the Royal Family.
Frustration, anger, disappointment grew in both parts of the Royal Family. Harry and Meghan's decision to keep everyone "in the dark about their plans" about "creating their own website created enormous ill will in the palace and especially in the family."
For Harry, the biggest obstructions were due to the palace's dislike of Meghan, his wife. Simply some of the old palace guard do not like Meghan and they are not going to stop anything to make their lives more difficult, ”they say in the book.
Scobie, the author, maintains that it was difficult for Meghan as an American mongrel to join the Royal Family. "That was going to stir some feathers," he suggested.
Leave, a secret plan
The Sussexs decided that, instead of going to Sandringham Palace at Christmas, it was best to go to Canada to be alone, reflect and spend it with their friends and family. The queen found out when, unusually, she called them on the phone to invite them because she had not heard from them. Harry and Meghan informed him. With the tensions with the family, Sandringham would not be a vacation but a martyrdom. The queen authorized the trip.
Six weeks before leaving for Canada last year, Harry spoke to his father and grandmother, the sovereign, to discuss the needs for change. "He thought his popularity could finally be used, hunted by the press for the public fascination of this new disparate and undervalued royal family race within the walls of institutions." They had no response.
The book reveals the details of the couple's drastic decision: to leave the UK. (AFP)
When they left the country, in their Canadian nest in front of the water, after discussions with friends and Doria, Meghan's mother, they decided to give up their status as senior royals . They communicated it via Instagram. No one was informed before. Shock in the palace. The obstruction would begin so that they were not representatives of the queen.
When Harry wanted to set up an audience with the queen, his grandmother, courtiers at his father's court warned him that he was not available until January 27. They wanted to visit her on the spur of the moment when they landed in Britain, but they thought they would hurt themselves .
When they both arrived in Britain, they both pushed for a quick deal. "At this point they felt that they had argued long enough with the royal family in the past year and were sick of not being taken seriously," the book says. In the Sandringham negotiation, the "gray men" acted. Harry lost all his ties to the military, what he wanted most. The queen said that they would always be part of the family.
Harry and William had become inseparable after their mother's death. They lived together in York, the house opposite St. James's Palace. Then they moved together to Kensington Palace. When they got married, the press named them The Fabulous Four, along with Kate and Meghan . But that perfection was not to last.
The Cambridge, their new enemies
The Cambridge were furious that family matters had been made public by Harry and Meghan. "It is not heartbreak, they are hurt," said a source. They did not forgive his publication on Instagram. In the 21st century, hatred was repeated as under the reign of Henry XIII.
Scobie said that during the confinement nothing could be improved in the relationship between the two brothers. According to him, the courtiers accuse Meghan and some of the family as well.
The status of the relationship was evident when the Cambridge and the Sussex met at Westminster Abbey for Commonwealth service, alongside the Queen. The Cambridge did not speak to them. Meghan wanted to make contact with Kate, who publicly ignored her. The press only spoke of that incredible scene, with the sovereign present, in a real battle in front of her subjects. The crisis in full view, on television.
Harry with his grandmother, Queen Elizabeth. (AFP)
In her stunning parrot green gown, in her last official activity as a duchess (the farewell at Buckingham Palace) Meghan tearfully told a friend: “ I gave my whole life to this family. I was willing to do what had to be done. But here we are. It is very sad". And she went to Canada, probably never to return to Britain. Archie had stayed there with his babysitter. She felt apprehensive that they wanted to extort her so that Archie should remain in the kingdom, as part of the line of succession.
Elizabeth II, the last queen?
A Sussex spokesman said, "The Duke and Duchess were not interviewed or contributed to Finding Freedom ." Buckingham Palace declined to comment.
The book is a serious image problem again for the Windsor and for the heirs to the throne. Twenty-three years after Princess Diana's death alongside Dodi Al Fayed, her summer boyfriend, on the Pont du Soul in Paris, Harry faces the same dramas and prejudices from his family that she endured until the end of her life.
The Sussex believe that their stories are leaked by other members of the Royal Family to the British tabloids, against whom they have brought suit. The book is a harder book than Andrew Morton's, with the consent of Princess Diana. Only Queen Elizabeth can repair such a division, in her last chapter, so that the monarchy continues after her death .
London. Correspondent
AS