King Charles III and Prince Harry arrive for the Committal Service for Queen Elizabeth II held at St George's Chapel in Windsor. Photo / AP
OPINION:
In the long, winding, millennia-plus of English kings having sat on thrones, they have been brought down by axes, swords, arrows, longbows, drowned in a vat of wine, syphilis, falling off the occasional horse, a hunting “accident”, gout, hubris, and various monarchs permanently unslaked desire to invade France.
But could King Charles III be the first monarch to be felled by a Macbook Air? (Death by a thousand characters?)
Right now in the publishing world, two of the most closely guarded secrets would have to be when exactly Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex’s autobiography will hit shelves and just what the devil he is set to reveal about his titled family.
Like a hand grenade lobbed right onto the Buckingham Palace forecourt, the question that courtiers, anyone with an HRH and even the most junior footmen must surely want answered, is, just how much damage will this literary IED do to the newbie king and Queen Camilla?
If Charles had been looking for any sort of reassurance, then let’s hope he has not had a chance to peruse The Daily Beast on Monday with the cup of Earl Grey and shortbread finger he has for elevenses.
According to the Beast’s impeccably-sourced royal correspondent Tom Sykes, the news on the book front is bad for Charles, with one royal insider saying that one chapter in particular “could spell big trouble” for the 72-year-old. (Maybe Charles should think about having a go at reclaiming Normandy as a distraction?)
Is it any surprise then that, per Sykes, “anxiety over the content of Prince Harry’s memoir is growing in the royal family’s inner circle”?
What is particularly interesting is that, reportedly, it is not the new season of The Crown and it’s lavish recreation of Charles’ philandering, tampon-fancying ways that has Palace brows furrowed and fountain pens being bitten, nor Harry and wife Meghan, Duchess of Sussex’s mysterious Netflix documentary.
Oh no. Instead, Sykes reports that “courtiers are moderately sanguine” about these projects.
The duchess, after all, has managed via two high-profile interviews in the last two months to make herself look both ridiculous and boring. Take away her marriage and her very famous in-laws and Meghan is just as interesting and insightful as you would expect a B-list actress from a middling cable dramedy to be. Which is to say, she is pathologically unable to not talk about herself. Talk about being hoisted on your own PR.
Her husband though? He’s another kettle of fish entirely and for royal aides, “Harry’s book is seen as a different order of threat.”
For 35 years the duke’s life, identity and for many years, his job, was defined by his royal status. Contrast that with his mother Diana, Princess of Wales, who had only clocked up 10 years as a Windsor wife, with all the attendant heartbreak and misery that seems to be part and parcel of that gig, when she decided to tell all to Andrew Morton.
The duke, though, has a literal lifetime of revelations, dirt and secrets to draw on, not to mention the Viking-sized battle axe he has to grind with his family. That combination of extraordinary inside knowledge, including how Princess Anne fashions her iconic backcombed pouf, and decades of grievances?
This book could well end up being the equivalent of the Gunpowder Plot 2.0.
Nor would the death of his grandmother appear to have tempered Harry’s approach, with the Beast reporting that “the prospect of a full-blooded assault on the monarchy by Harry” is triggering “alarm” among royal insiders.
The Times’ royal editor Valentine Low, and author of the recent bombshell Courtiers: The Hidden Power Behind The Crown, told Sykes “that he had knowledge of a meeting between Harry and a private individual (not a Palace staffer) while Harry was in London. The person gently suggested to Harry he might go easy on his family in the book.”
How was the advice received? About as well as a vegan scotch egg at a shooting lunch it sounds like. “Harry was not very receptive to the idea,” Low has said.
What will further set the Duke of Sussex’s book apart is that it is being ghostwritten by Pulitzer-winner J.R. Moehringer. Earlier this year, celebrated royal biographer Robert Lacey, told the Guardian that Harry sat for “intense interviews” with Moehringer when he was “at just about peak rage” and prior to the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee.
Meanwhile, a publishing source told Page Six in July that the book is “juicy” with another saying, “There is some content in there that should make his family nervous.”
The real kicker here for Charles is the timing.
Only months into his reign, the king simply does not have the public capital to easily withstand a full-frontal offensive by his own son, if that is what the book ends up being.
The world has only just recently, sorta, kinda been willing to forget about how, for decades, Charles was the posterboy for bad husbands and lacklustre dads everywhere. (In 1991, he proved he would never be getting one of those “Best Father Eva” mugs when Prince William ended up in hospital and surgery for a skull fracture after being hit in the head with a golf club at school. Diana rushed to his bedside and stayed the night. And his dad? Why, Charles tootled off to host some government ministers at a performance of Tosca.)
If Harry’s book lobbs a fresh round of a stinging accusations, for example, of rotten parenting, general neglect or poor treatment by his father and/or the Palace machine, then it will be a serious body blow to the new Carolean age (as the reign of a monarch named Charles is technically known as).
Sure, His Majesty will weather the storm but again, the issue here is time.
While his mother had 70 long years to create a legacy, the king must know he is looking at around 20 years in the top job, a very finite period in which to leave his mark on the UK and to finally get a chance to rule.
What the 72-year-old can’t afford is to waste precious months or years trying to put out PR fires and having to figure out how to countermand another relative busily telling the world what a dismal human being he is.
There is another possibility to consider here.
Tina Brown, author of seminal The Diana Chronicles and more recently The Palace Papers, recently raised the possibility that the book might never be released.
“[The Sussexes] are now in this bind, where they’ve taken all this money and Harry has made this book deal where he’s supposed to spill everything about his horrible life as a royal, but now he’s actually tortured about it because he understands there is no way back if he does it,” she said during an appearance at a UK literary festival earlier this month.
“I always thought at some point a deal would be made and Charles would have to pay back the advance to stop Harry writing this book.”
Which would be something of a win, win. The Sussexes would get the cash they need to pay for their independent new life and Charles does end up buffeted by a fresh wave of bad press and can spend his days talking about his eco-powered Aston Martin rather than the fact he never read his kids Goodnight Moon or went to school sports days.
But could this Hail Mary of a move actually come to pass? Penguin Random House has Harry on the hook for the publishing coup of the millennium and if this book does “spell big trouble” for the freshly ensconced king, it could end up being a history-making bestseller of all time.
At the end of the day, there’s only one thing I can say for sure: Being king? It’s a mug’s game. If the arrows or the French don’t get you, your family will.
Daniela Elser is a writer and a royal commentator with more than 15 years’ experience working with a number of Australia’s leading media titles.
A live cook-off featured ox heart, wapiti, wild boar and plenty of edible wildlife.