William, Kate, Meghan and Harry attend a Christmas Day Church service in 2017. Photo / Getty Images
William, Kate, Meghan and Harry attend a Christmas Day Church service in 2017. Photo / Getty Images
OPINION:
If there are three words that should strike fear into the very heart of the royal family, not including “gluten-free shortbread”, “alcohol free gin” and “interpretative dance engagement”, then it would have to be “raw, unflinching honesty”.
This is what Penguin Random House has promised readers will get from Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex, with the former army captain turned semi-professional malcontent and irony-free purveyor of “truth” having penned a memoir. (Or at least was occasionally allowed to hold the pen while ghostwriter JR Moehringer went to make a cuppa.)
We got our first kinda, tiny taste of that “honesty” on Tuesday when two trailers for two confusingly similar interviews – with the UK’s ITV and the US’ 60 Minutes – to promote the book were released. Bottom line – King Charles, Prince William, The Firm and the British look set to get another splenetic serve for the cameras.
However, what has largely gone unnoticed in the scant details we have about the book, the pointedly titled Spare, is something much more controversial, much more shocking and potentially much more painful for the Prince of Wales – the events surrounding the death of their mother Diana, Princess of Wales.
In the last 24 hours, clues have emerged that point to Spare might not just offer up Harry’s “honesty” about the dramatic rupturing of relations in the royal family in recent years or the drama that lead up to the Sussexes’ historic departure for greener pastures (and all those greenbacks) in early 2020 but it might also explore the “circumstances” about Diana’s death.
First, ITV put out a statement ballyhooing the channel’s sit-down with Harry, and there tucked away was that, among other things, the TV chat would include “never-before-heard details surrounding the death of his mother, Diana”.
Kate, the Princess of Wales, Prince William, Prince of Wales, Prince Harry and Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, walk to meet members of the public at Windsor Castle, following the death of Queen Elizabeth II. Photo / AP
Then secondly, on Wednesday, the Daily Mail’s Sue Reid revealed that researchers for Harry’s book would seem to be looking into the crash in Paris that claimed Diana’s life. Reid writes that they “have contacted many of those who remember — or were otherwise connected to — the crash in the Pont de l’Alma road tunnel. These include eyewitnesses, French police who attended the scene and journalists — including me — who have investigated in great detail how and why Diana came to die.”
(Side note: Doesn’t the very nature of an autobiography negate the need for researchers?)
According to Reid, “Harry seems certain to touch on questions relating to the murky circumstances surrounding his mother’s death.”
Keep in mind here that two police investigations, in France and the UK, and an inquest in London all came to the same conclusion about that tragic night in Paris – that the combination of alcohol, the paparazzi and circumstance resulted in the accident that claimed the lives of the princess, her boyfriend Dodi Al Fayed, and driver Henri Paul.
But, the ITV statement and Reid’s researcher revelation suggest that the duke might not just write about the devastating loss of his mother in Spare but to possibly also explore the events that lead up to it.
And that is terrible news for William and Kate, Prince and Princess of Wales.
In the last year, Harry has repeatedly staked something of a claim on their mother’s legacy, telling People in April, “I honour my mother in everything I do. I am my mother’s son” and then last month in the Sussexes’ Netflix series saying, “my mum made most of her decisions, if not all of them, from her heart. And I am my mother’s son.”
In this August 9, 1987 photo, Diana, the Princess of Wales holds son Prince Harry. Photo / AP
If William has been lumped into the Charles role in the current reboot of the 1990s war of the Wales’, a dutiful regal foot soldier who has wholly thrown his lot in with the crown, then Harry would seem to have cast himself as the Diana of today, a man driven by passion and willing to speak up about Buckingham Palace’s perceived sins.
That has extended to Harry’s willingness to repeatedly lay bare his pain at the loss of their mother at such a young age, such as saying “there’s a lot of grief that still needs to be let out” in 2017, in contrast to the fact that we have only ever really gotten the briefest of glimpses at William’s suffering.
More recently, in the wake of the passing of Queen Elizabeth, the 40-year-old told a member of the public during a walkabout to greet mourners outside Windsor Castle that it was a “difficult” time and reminded him of his mother’s funeral. The Times reported that when one well-wisher “told the emotional Prince she was close to tears,” he replied: “Don’t cry now – you’ll start me.”
But, just because we have one brother who is more willing to talk about the loss in the public arena and another who has largely mourned in private, that does not take away from the toll that digging up the princess’ death might take on William.
In May 2021, William released a highly unusual video statement following the findings of the Dyson inquiry that the BBC’s Martin Bashir lied to get Diana to agree to her 1995 Panorama interview and went on to make his position staunchly clear – to his mind, it should never be aired again.
And yet there in the Sussexes’ recent Netflix series was, what else, but clips from that very Panorama interview, a move that left William “infuriated” and “disappointed”, the Mail reported at the time.
William and Harry walk beside each other after viewing the floral tributes for the late Queen Elizabeth II outside Windsor Castle. Photo / AP
If Harry is about to potentially reopen wounds surrounding their mother’s death then it will make for a double-whammy for the future king who looks likely to come in for a fresh pasting.
Reporting out of London earlier this week revealed that, according to “a source with knowledge” of Spare, it is the elder prince who is painted in the harshest light.
“It’s tough on William, in particular, and even Kate gets a bit of a broadside,” the source said. “There are these minute details, and a description of the fight between the brothers. I personally can’t see how Harry and William will be able to reconcile after this.”
(This comes, of course, after Harry accused William of “screaming and shouting” at him during the Sandringham Summit and of his aides “leaking” stories to the press in the Sussexes’ Netflix series.)
For Kate, right now, watching her formerly close brother-in-law on the cusp of yet another offensive, and with not only her husband reportedly in his sights but her too, must be a particularly hard experience, not least because there is nothing they can do.
Unlike in the wake of Harry and Meghan’s Oprah interview, when we got the now-iconic “recollections may vary” statement, so far, Buckingham and Kensington Palaces have assiduously refused to comment on the Sussexes’ broadsides, instead adopting a heads-down, just getting on with the job guv’nor approach.
However that public stoicism and resolve stands in contrast to the Telegraph’s Camilla Tominey recently reporting that the Wales’ have been left “devastated” by the Sussexes’ brickbats, a situation exacerbated by the fact the family is only months on from the late Queen’s death.
The way things look today, there may well be more discomfort and sadness for William and Kate to come.
Late last year, a friend of the Wales’ told The Daily Beast: “The brothers were so close, they had such an incredible bond. It’s impossible really to express what a massive, terrible, ongoing headache this has been for William in the past few years.”
Now? That “headache” could be about to become much, much worse.
