The Queen of the United Kingdom has died.
The nation mourns her death, and every subject takes from it – or perhaps projects onto it – a meaning that feels both personal and profound.
But looking beyond the outpouring of grief, praise and inevitable celebration, what we see is less a remarkable woman born to lavish privilege and more an individual who never released her own authentic potential.
Not even the act of bearing children was wholly her own. The births of her children were public events that re-stocked the monarchy, providing an heir, a second heir, a third, and finally a fourth. Until, that is, the heirs had children, when the already complex succession table was reset and her grandchildren entered into the running.
Apparently the reason why she was not so close or motherly to Charles was that he represented her death, because his primary purpose is to replace her. Yet one cannot believe that a woman with such a pleasant face and warm demeanor would feel the threat in terms of power and importance, and rather it will have been the awareness that her eldest son was first an heir and only second a son that would act to distance them.
The only person for whom there was no official retirement, finally she has managed to escape this state of half existence. To serve the people cost her her life even while she lived it. In some sense Elizabeth died when she became queen, and the life we saw her live was not hers but the people’s. It was planned, choreographed and measured in every aspect and to the minutest degree, rather like that of a prisoner. Indeed, if she did not quite die at her coronation then she was handed a life sentence, a life her uncle David, King Edward VIII, had the good sense to realise would not have been his own.
Even her husband was not her own, whom she was forced to publicly emasculate in front of the entire world when he knelt in submission before her. Men should do that for their women anyway, but not in public for the benefit of a primeval institution.
Throughout her life as a monarch people did not see her as a person. Everyone, most of all Elizabeth herself, was taught that she is a monarch first and a person second. As with all those deemed royal, in the context of other people Elizabeth never knew who she really could be and only knew what she was expected to be. Most assuredly she will have had thoughts that were authentically her own regarding who she was and how she felt about her predicament, and perhaps there were one or two people who on occasion were privy to these untainted aspects. But they were unlikely to have been people ordinary enough to give her the sense of freedom from scrutiny and expectation necessary to forge an authentic self in a community of peers. She had no peers, no equals, and lived instead on the lonely pedestal upon which all others beneath had raised her.
It is right to feel sadness for this woman, particularly because she was used as the sacrificial lamb that saved the monarchy. Undoubtedly she knew moments of happiness, and perhaps at times was grateful for not having to bother with the mundane daily tasks most of us are compelled to carry out. But we will likely never know, because no one was ever allowed to ask, and she was never allowed to divulge, her true feelings on this or any other matter. Perhaps if she had been offered a life of anonymity of a reasonable standard she might have taken it. Or Perhaps not. The important point is that she did not even have the option to choose free of the threat of censure and disgrace hanging over, and opprobrium would surely have been poured over her by the establishment that imprisoned her as it still pours it over her uncle. Besides, she had been bred for the part as soon as it was clear it would fall to her, more so than if she had remained a minor royal in the shadows. She knew little else.
Many compare Elizabeth to their own mother or grandmother. I share this sentiment, and recall how I realised only too late that my mother longed for her own time and space, especially in her later years, yet rarely enjoyed them to any meaningful degree. With five children, each of whom would phone or pass by each day, much of her time was spent on us and our cares, with little left to call her own. Time and space in which she was free of the necessity to be a mother and simply to be herself, to do as she pleased or indeed do nothing at all.
Multiply this a thousand times for Elizabeth. With the scrutiny of a global press, royal duties, the necessity to attend countless public events and make small talk with those she met, gushing and fawning at her, one begins to appreciate the enormity of the sacrifice made of her. There were things that she liked of course – her horses, corgis, hunting, and her Land Rover, to make a swift though quite comprehensive review of her apparent pleasures in life. Only they were little compensation when set against the impositions of being queen. Having to record a Christmas message each year and make it heart felt and convincing is manageable, but the relentless affairs of state, travel, introductions, and trivial exchanges with those she met will have exacted a cost far greater than any privilege or comfort she was able to enjoy. Right up till the end, Elizabeth lived a life similar to her horses, though with one important difference. She was kept, groomed, trained and put out on show like them, yet unlike her horses, never allowed to retire and they flogged her till the last. All of us with older parents and grandparents know how tranquil respite is so necessary for older people, to be in their own time, at their own pace and at their own whim. She wasn’t even allowed that.
Finally, God saved Elizabeth. Though as Charles might be thinking, he took his time.