IF YOU listen to news reports, the entire world — Britain and the United States in particular — was insane waiting for the birth of the Royal Baby. (Unless Kate Middleton’s labor has been unduly grueling, the child should have arrived yesterday.)
![]() | ![]() | | Diana and Charles with William and Harry after their births. | ![]() | ![]() |
Well, sure, in the U.K. people are very invested. They will always love their monarchy, despite periodic grumblings. After all, Britain is hardly a world power anymore. Billions of dollars are accrued by tourism — tourists who want to gaze upon Buckingham Palace, or the site where Anne Boleyn was beheaded. England needs the monarchy. Financially, if not as emotionally as it did in the past.
But just as the engagement and wedding of Kate and William were, I think, manufactured “sensations” here in the USA, the same goes for the birth of their first child. They are a charming couple. Attractive and as modern as British royalty can ever be allowed to be. For sure they are more in touch and more accessible than previous royals.
However, I recall the birth of William. And then Harry. Now, those births were genuine sensations, here and abroad. Why? Because their mother was Diana, Princess of Wales. A girl who became instantly iconic the day the paparazzi conned her into posing against a sunlit garden, her proper skirt made deliciously transparent.
By the time Diana had given birth to William, she was the most popular British royal, a true star. A superstar, in fact. And one about whom the world was already beginning to worry and wonder over. Her weight, her relationship with Prince Charles, her moods, her tears. America was just as besotted as Britain. Diana was not a distant figure. She was as real to America as Elizabeth Taylor, Jackie Onassis and Madonna. (Hard to imagine that there once was a time when these four incredible women essentially ruled celebritydom, each existing in her own crazy sphere of stardom.)
In time, Diana became the poster princess of startling candor in the era of Oprah, self-expression and self-explanation. Her bulimia, fractious relationship with her in-laws, disobeying the rules, cunning publicity stunts, a truly charitable nature, a neurotic and self-absorbed nature, shocking revelations, divorce, reinvention as a sexy single, defiant woman, and then her horrible, shocking death. It was all “too much” and led to the legendary outpouring of grief that even that Queen had to grudgingly acknowledge. |
