AS I WAS SAYING
Actually, the people these few weeks have been bad for are the republicans
PEREGRINE WORSTHORNE
It was boredom that finally drove the French people to do away with their monarchy in 1848, and whatever the British people may feel about the monarchy in 1997, it is certainly not boredom. The story of that last king is worth recalling. Rather than calling himself 'King of France', he called himself `King of the French' — i.e. the people's king. Rather than dressing himself up in brocaded uniform, he dressed down in the clothes of the man of the street. Rather than surrounding himself with ancien regime noblemen, he surround- ed himself with members of the new bour- geoisie. It didn't work. The people grew bored and sent him packing, and then took the first opportunity to opt again for a fur- ther period of Napoleonic drama and excitement.
Drama and excitement, however, are pre- cisely what our royal family does provide, to a quite extraordinary degree, and not only for the British but, it would seem, for the entire human race. Far from boring the people, the monarchy clearly fascinates the people, obsesses the people. Even female columnists who claim to be `indifferent' write about little else. Those who solemnly proclaim that the monarchy is irrelevant to the modern world, therefore, are plainly wrong. It is essentially relevant. Nothing about Britain today is more relevant. In the monarchy we have a unique asset. So far as the rest of the world is concerned, it is the most important thing about us.
If anything, it seems to me, the tragic death of Diana, Princess of Wales confirms rather than contradicts this truth. What would the human race do without the house of Windsor? Its births, deaths and mar- riages have become an important part of everyone's life, and, in the same way, that even the most anticlerical Italian has to recognise that it is the papacy which puts Italy on the map, so must even the most republican Englishman recognise that it is the monarchy which puts Britain on the map. Would it be too much to say that the British monarchy, like the papacy, has become a universal institution? I don't think so. Both, in their different ways, help to bring light into the world, and never has this universalist side of the monarchy been seen to such good effect as during the last few weeks. How this has happened is difficult to say, but it has happened and today it makes no more sense to talk of abolishing the monarchy than it does to talk of abolishing Shakespeare.
That should be the starting point of any serious discussion about the monarchy, but it does not seem to be. Since coming back from holiday last week, I have been invited to take part in two television programmes asking the question, 'Has the monarchy a future?' as if the answer was in doubt. The Queen's ambivalent reaction to the Diana tragedy, it was said, showed that she was out of touch with the modern age, just as Prince Charles's male chauvinist attitude to his wife showed him to be ante- diluvian. But surely what these criticisms showed was a widespread desire not to get rid of the monarchy but to modernise it. If the public, sensing the Queen's ambiva- lence about her daughter-in-law, had expressed their disapproval of this luke- warm attitude by asking her to stay away from the funeral, that would indeed have been worrying. But of course they did exactly the opposite. Her participation was felt to be essential. For the people to mourn was not enough. For the mourning to be complete the Sovereign had to take the lead. Only with her active participation could the catharsis be complete.
In other words, this so-called anger against the Queen took the form of wanting more of her rather than wanting less; of expressing love, albeit frustrated love, rather than indifference. Heaven knows, the popular demands were scarcely radical, let alone revolutionary: that the Union Jack should fly at half-mast and that the Queen should come out of the palace before the funeral to share the grief of the crowds. If this is republicanism, then Tom Paine might as well never have uttered. That there is a demand for monarchical mod- ernisation is certainly the case, but the last thing true republicans have ever wanted is modernisation, because modernisation spells prolongation.
A lot of defeatist nonsense has been writ- ten on the subject of modernisation, quite a bit by me. Strip away the pomp and pageantry, protocol and ceremonial, and nothing much would be left. The yawning gap between the royals and the people could not be narrowed without putting majesty at risk. That has been my drift. But the Princess has shown this to be untrue. Yes, she was very much a people's princess, as Mr Blair called her, but the emphasis should be put quite as much on the noun as on the adjective. Most of the pictures of her on the Kensington Palace railings, I noticed, had her wearing a tiara — every inch a princess. In the old days when monarchs ruled they had to overawe. That the people should fear them was far more important than that they should love them. Hence the protocol about royals always being portrayed as stern and formal, usual- ly on horseback, and never smiling and friendly. Now that monarchs only reign rather than rule, however; much of the cer- emony and protocol designed to maintain distance — with a view to overawing — can safely be dispensed with. The Princess proved that and it is a lesson which I do not doubt the royal family has taken very much to heart.
Not that they had not begun to do so before. When I was young the most charac- teristic shot of a royal was inspecting a mili- tary guard of honour. In recent years it has increasingly become attending charitable functions. Long before the Princess came on the scene Prince Charles took the lead in this respect. Also, unlike the Duke of Edin- burgh, who in his heyday was most charac- teristically photographed in uniform, the son is most characteristically portrayed in mufti. Clearly more softening up will have to be done before the monarchy catches up with the new age but, with Mr Blair in charge, this should present no difficulty.
Here the monarchy is very fortunate. Just as Mr Disraeli proved the ideal prime min- ister to give Queen Victoria a triumphant new lease of life towards the end of her reign, Mr Blair looks like being the ideal prime minister to do the same for our pre- sent Queen. Whether he meant to under- take this task is difficult to say. But having won such great popular acclaim for his statesmanship in steering the royal family through the Diana drama, he is unlikely not to wish to continue to play this Disraelian — not to mention Baldwinian — role which has already served him so well. New Labour — new monarchy. Of all the strange and surprising things to flow from the Princess's tragic death, that partnership may prove to be the most historic.
All's well that ends well. Great constitu- tional changes are afoot and they will cer- tainly include the monarchy. But my guess is that Mr Blair will include the monarchy — particularly Prince Charles — as a part- ner rather than a target. Pity the republi- cans. It is for them that the bells are truly tolling.
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