The brutal death of the “princess of hearts” in 1997 had sparked immense emotion in the kingdom. The Queen, who died on September 8 at the age of 96, had, for her part, remained ice. After six days, she agreed to get out of her silence.
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“Where is our queen? Where is her flag?” This September 4, 1997, the United Kingdom is in shock and it is towards Elizabeth II that the popular anger expressed by this “one” of the Sun. Five days after the brutal death, at 36, of the “princess of hearts” that had become Lady Diana, her ex-Bru, the country is in tears, but the sovereign remains locked in her Scottish Château de Balmoral.
In front of Buckingham, the flowers and candles are piling up, but the flag which signals the presence of the queen shines by her absence. For the first time in decades, Elizabeth II failed in her image of Queen Model. She who sponsors so many charitable institutions is unable to share the emotion of her subjects. His drought in these tragic moments translates what England has long understood: prisoner of an outdated family morality and also probably of her own jealousy towards Diana, the queen refuses to return to London.
She will not do so until September 5, after six days that will shake the British monarchy. It will take the recall to the order of the new Labor Prime Minister Tony Blair, aware of the political risk started for himself by this anger against the crown, so that the queen agrees to participate in a media staging by breaking with the protocol Who wants it to address the country until Christmas.
“Was the tone sufficiently contrite?”
After going to meet the crowd massaged in front of the Buckingham gates, she gives a live speech – a first – where in mourning dress and a frozen air, she praises her ex- Bru “an exceptional and talented person”. “Was the tone contrite enough?” She asked the BBC team after this communication exercise where, behind big glasses, she says she speaks “of the bottom of the heart as a queen and grand- mother “. Tony Blair will find other words. He will salute “the princess of the people”.
Elizabeth II finally concedes national funeral to the Westminster Abbey for the one who, according to her, was no longer part of the family since her divorce with Charles, formalized on August 28, 1996. Three million people will follow the funeral procession which will mark the end of an endless family and dynastic psychodrama.
When Charles and Diana Spencer conversely convenient with great fanfare, on July 29, 1981 in St Paul Cathedral, the bride is considered by the Queen as a bruise and future ideal queen: resulting from the aristocracy, discreet and virgin. But marriage of reason is promised to disaster. Charles passes with his mistress Camilla Parker Bowles the night before his union with Diana. “We were three in this marriage, it was a little bit overcrowded,” said the princess of Wales later. Intimate humiliation in public scandal, the shy wife turns into an imprecator of the monarchy. Elizabeth II, anxious to ensure dynastic succession, will take years to accept the idea of a divorce.
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