I separate the news of the last few years into three categories: the war in Ukraine, the pandemic and the Royal Family. Harry and Meghan’s decision to move to the States and the subsequent podcasts, Oprah interviews, Piers Morgan walkouts, documentaries, deaths and Jeremy Clarkson rants have been unavoidable; their media presence is as strong as ever despite only half of the available credentials coming from the couple themselves. To some level, I comprehend their desire to control the narrative. Journalists have so misconstrued their reasons for stepping back it’s impossible to pinpoint what their exact reason was. On paper, a highly publicised interview with Oprah seems a moronic and attention-seeking thing to do, however, taking into account the scrutiny Meghan and Harry faced as well as the manipulation of the words they said, the dismissal of the outfits they wore and the disapproval of the destinations they travelled, perhaps it was the only way to take back what was theirs. I’ve found that those who vehemently dislike the couple tend to be monarchists, individuals who refuse to believe that this centuries-old institution, which was rooted in a time of toxicity and sexism, could possibly remain this way.
Harry’s tell-all memoir Spare came out this week and I gave it a listen on Audible. I won't go into the viral Tiktok sounds though I can assure you, they still sound odd and out of place within their context. The book begins shortly after Prince Philip’s funeral which took place in April 2021. Harry writes of loitering in the gardens, waiting for the arrival of his brother and father whom he’d agreed to meet as he somberly reflects on how the estate in which he stands was built to be his forever home. He writes of how he’d learnt of his grandfather’s death the week prior, having woken up to 32 missed calls and his grandmother then calling him and telling him that his grandfather had passed.
The book is beautifully written, it’s quite obvious he had the assistance of a ghostwriter. The prose is poetic, particularly in the moments Harry is left alone with his own thoughts. The undying and heartbreaking love Harry has for his mother is present throughout the text; the twelve-year-old boy who was forced to follow his mother’s coffin in front of the world is never far from people's minds. And it’s certainly never far from Harry either, for he mentions his overwhelming longing for his mother whilst waiting for his three surviving family members. When William and Charles do arrive, he speaks of how they were walking in sync as though on their way to a duel. Harry, accustomed to the pair of them arguing, finds their stance intimidating before the three even liaise. And yes, he does call Williams’ baldness ‘alarming’, in the first chapter.
Harry’s few memories of his mother’s death are extremely poignant. He walked into his father’s bedroom where Charles, wearing a long white dressing gown which I can imagine was Scrooge-like, informed him of the tragedy in Paris. Charles’ voice was apparently shaken, and Harry’s empathy for his father is obvious; the man had to sit with the knowledge for hours, knowing that both his young sons had lost their mother. Charles apparently spent hours alone in the bedroom, swallowing the news and preparing himself for the worldwide outcry to follow. Harry reasons that his mother couldn’t be dead and that she would be hiding, noting that his birthday being in the next two weeks would be reason for her to make contact. Of course, the day passed and no communication was made. And after the funeral, Harry was forced to ‘cheerily’ return to Eton College. He refers to Diana’s passing as his ‘mummy’s disappearance’ in subsequent chapters, clinging to the idea that she would eventually reach out to him.
Harry speaks of Charles very lovingly for the majority of the text; the prince recalls calling his father the day after being photographed wearing a Nazi uniform at a costume party. His father was 'serene' and tells him his actions were a result of 'the foolishness of youth', and that Harry was unlucky that his mistakes would be documented for the world to see.
I enjoyed Chapter 20, in which Harry wrote of how anguishing it was for his father for his youngest son to be both the ‘difficult’ and ‘stupid’ one. A lot of education, according to Harry, was a memory game: memorising literary quotations and mathematic formulas was the key to obtaining good grades. And understandably, memory wasn’t an area of Harry’s brain that he wanted to utilise: remembering things meant remembering his mother and the hope that she was alive that was fading over time. Charles’ love for Shakespeare confused and bored his son, and in an attempt to impress his father, Harry began Hamlet, though he found the plotline about a lonely prince obsessing over a dead parent too overwhelming to complete. Nonetheless, he allowed Charles to take him on countless Stratford trips to watch Shakespeare’s plays despite not understanding most of the dialogue. A book Harry did enjoy however was Of Mice and Men, and he writes how he found the brotherhood between George and Lennie similar to the relationship he shared with William.
It’s undeniable that Harry has gone through extreme hardships in his life mentally and he has demonstrated admirable resilience. His ‘wild child’ years, to me, were merely a case of a young man tiring of constantly being followed and pressured to succeed. Whilst his insights into his familial relationships with his stepmother and sister-in-law are blunt, I appreciate the lack of sugarcoating. The relationship between Harry and Camila, to me, is to be expected: the woman had an affair with his father whilst he was still married to Diana and neither Harry nor William had any reason to unconditionally love and respect her. They seem to have done the best they can. I don’t abide with those who conduct themselves as blameless and I don’t believe Harry does this within the text: he writes of a time he physically attacked his bodyguard whilst drunk and his regrets over his language use in his younger years. He’s brutally honest about his previous girlfriends, saying he ‘cherished’ Chelsy Davy’s ‘carefree and authentic spirit’ and how she wore ‘short skirts and high boots’ without a care in the world. He decided, and probably rightly so, that he couldn’t ask her to give up so much if she were to marry him. At one point, Harry asked Chelsy’s brother to check the underside of the car for a tracking device. Unsurprisingly, there was one, explaining the paparazzi frenzy Chelsy was forced to undergo in Cape Town.
Harry's coverage of his relationship with Caroline Flack is respectfully brief and mirrors what Caroline said in her own memoir - the media tainted and spoiled it, a pivotal moment being when the press took it upon themselves to camp outside of Caroline's parents' and grandparents' homes.
He also writes of an argument he had with Meghan in which he ‘snapped’ at her, speaking to her ‘harshly, cruelly’, and it appears his regret is still so consuming he can’t describe what his exact words were. Meghan appears for the first time in the book in the latter half and there isn’t much that wasn’t already revealed in the documentary. We’re given the full account of the ‘Kate made Meghan cry’ tabloid tale, which ended the same way Meghan told Oprah: Kate turning up at the house with an apology card and flowers. But their argument, in which Harry blamed 'the wine getting to his head', ended in Meghan telling him she wouldn't raise children in an atmosphere of 'anger or disrespect'. She insists he returns to therapy, having once tried unsuccessfully.
The racism Meghan has faced at the hands of the press in Britain is indisputable. I don't blame Harry for wanting to move his family away; his mother and the turmoil she went through is a constant shadow eclipsing Harry's everyday life. I don't believe that every single thing Harry and Meghan have told the press has been completely honest - there was probably some exaggeration here, and manipulation of words there, however, Harry's memoir reads as sincere, a transparent account of grief and an insight into the monarchy. The idea that he woke up most mornings up until the age of 23 with the hope that his mother would reach out is nothing short of devastating and demonstrative of the lack of support he received.
That said, I really enjoyed listening to the memoir. It's a strong, moving piece of work.
Hello everyone!
I hope 2023 has been kind to you so far. I always find this time of year really hard and I've been giving myself as many distractions as possible. I've set myself a target to read at least 40 books this year, you can track my Goodreads challenge here.
I hope you're all well. See you next week!
Karisma
xxx