A Son of the Rock

Well, we may not have had much bread but today we had the circus.

I was glad of the day off but I can’t say I feel any better for it. The next few years are going to be rough economically. The Government has done the exact opposite of what was required to ameliorate the recession.

Still, nothing like a bit of pageantry to distract the plebs, eh?

I wish the couple concerned nothing but well for themselves but the advantages they have will (bar the revolution, and perhaps even in that remote likelihood) ensure they want for nothing. The bride in particular seems to be much more in tune with her new husband than her groom’s mother ever was. In the bits that I saw there was a perceptible warmth between them; a warmth entirely absent from Charles and Diana’s relationship. Their marriage might have a better chance of long term success as a result.

Diana was a lamb to the slaughter; a sacrifice to (some of) the British public’s appetite for figureheads and royal babies to bill and coo over. Her tragedy – if it was a tragedy – was that she didn’t realise it, at least not until it was way too late, and then she didn’t accept that noblesse oblige.

The purpose of a royal consort is to provide an heir – and spare. Once Diana had done that she became an adjunct, decoration, window dressing. Her personality couldn’t cope with that nor that Charles had never been interested in her beyond his dynastic responsibilities: before their marriage they had met very few times.

She did however carve out for herself a niche as an object of glamour, a celebrity.

I don’t think the new Duchess of Cambridge (and Countess of Strathearn) is as innocent, and there is no doubt that she has had a “normal” courtship with her husband. Ten years is enough to get to know anybody.

Doubtless the dynastically necessary babies will be along soon enough.