The Prince of Wails

By Martha Duffy

Last week Queen Elizabeth II was doing the sort of thing a 20th century monarch is supposed to do: moving gracefully through a state visit to Russia, the first ever by a British sovereign. At her side was her consort, the Duke of Edinburgh, elegantly performing his task, which is simply to support her. Custom and ceremony incarnate, they were national symbols to be proud of.

Back on home turf, another royal couple was doing what the world has become all too familiar with: the Waleses were slugging it out in the headlines. Bitterly estranged for nearly two years, both Prince Charles and the Princess of Wales have used the press to court public sympathy and approval. In the meantime, Squidgygate and Camillagate have become part of trendy patois; front-page dramas have been cranked up over crank phone calls; and James Hewitt's confessional has redefined the word cad. Last week the battle reached what may be the climactic point. The Sunday Times printed excerpts from Jonathan Dimbleby's approved biography of the prince, to be published Nov. 3. The author, a distinguished broadcaster and journalist, produced the documentary on Charles shown last summer in which the prince admitted to adultery. In addition to conducting long interviews with his subject, Dimbleby had access to diaries, letters and other records. The portrait he presents is shocking.

* Charles, it appears, was never in love with Diana. He claims to have entered the marriage under severe pressure from his father Prince Philip, who is depicted as a bully with a scathing tongue, easily capable, when Charles was a child, of reducing him to tears. In having a bride thrust upon him, Charles felt "ill used and impotent." His mother was remote and passive, usually leaving family matters to her husband. Along the way, institutions come in for criticism: Gordonstoun School -- picked, of course, by Philip -- was for Charles a hell of hazing and teasing. And the media never knew their place.

In fact the prince seems eager to blame anyone at all for his problems. It is bad enough to reveal to the world -- including his sons -- accounts of his wife's mood swings and depressions. It is now clear that Charles somehow thinks if he besmirches Diana enough, he will be rinsed in the process. He and his advisers seem genuinely surprised that the public hasn't turned on her as her emotional storms are revealed. It seems lost on them that the princess's popularity is genuine, not something he can bestow or withdraw.

But Charles' resentment of his wife's success is familiar now. What is new is his willingness to disparage his parents. Prince Philip had a ready retort, sheathed in a brusque politesse of understatement that is totally beyond Charles: "I've never discussed private matters, and I don't think the Queen has. Very few members of the family have." So there.

Anyone who thinks Charles will "stand aside" in favor of Prince William should reconsider. He is hell-bent to secure the throne. It was widely reported that he was very cross with the Queen three years ago when she announced in a speech that hers was "a job for life." The question now seems to be whether his judgment is too flawed for him to be an effective King, especially in the modern age, when a monarch is expected to mind his ceremonial business and stay out of politics, as well as inflammatory religious, environmental and especially constitutional areas. To wage the image battle, at once vengeful and quixotic, is to endanger the fragile institution he serves. If he needs a reminder, it came in the Economist. The establishment weekly has called for Britain to become a republic.

Charles ought to relax. The constitution is largely on his side. As Rodney Barker, senior lecturer in government at the London School of Economics, points out, "The monarch has to be a communicating member of the Church of England and may not be a Roman Catholic or married to one. Beyond that there aren't many constitutional constraints. If the prince and princess do divorce, there is no reason why the prince should not be King." Most commentators agree that Charles can remarry in a Church of Scotland ceremony -- the Church of England does not recognize remarriage -- and still become King, as long as his new wife is not Catholic.

Last week's press coverage -- as usual, extravagant in its length -- emphasized the line "What could Charles have been thinking of?" The Daily Mail summarized what was being repeatedly said, from the tabloids to the more intellectual Guardian and Independent: "In many ways he has shown himself to be a dutiful monarch-in-waiting, anxious to defend Britain's heritage and champion the social concerns of ... the inner cities. Nevertheless, his royal cooperation with this book is one of the worst blunders he has made. He was grievously ill advised."

Whom does he turn to for advice? Mainly aristocratic friends of long standing like Minister of the Armed Forces Nicholas Soames, the Duke of Westminster and, of course, his "confidante," Camilla Parker Bowles. Crucial too is his private secretary, Richard Aylard, a brilliant courtier who has a gift for repackaging his boss's problems as new opportunities.

The Dimbleby book resulted from two causes. In the mid-'80s Charles became interested in what his mentor, spiritual guru Laurens van der Post, told him about "getting in touch with my soul." Second, he was aghast at the portrait that emerged from Andrew Morton's book Diana: Her True Story, which painted him as a callous husband and distant father. Charles thought by telling his true story he could rescue his reputation. The project was undertaken with care; staff members, friends and journalists were consulted about a potential writer.

Diana, meantime, has been at work on her public image, newly damaged by errant phone calls and Hewitt's tale. The Independent reported that press lord Rupert Murdoch, usually an antiroyalist, has had drinks with the princess at Kensington Palace. On a visit to Washington last weekend, Diana was guest of honor at a dinner given by Katharine Graham, owner of the Washington Post. She has made it clear that she has not encouraged any cooperation with Morton's forthcoming follow-up tell-all, Diana: Her New Life, which will appear next month. A pirated section of the book, published in a French magazine, projected the divorce settlement at more than $30 million.

Some of the issues that both the media and the public enjoy chewing on do not really amount to much. One has to do with Diana's title after divorce. Can she still be Princess of Wales? "It is all a matter of precedence and convention, and there is a good deal of flexibility," says Barker. Philip, vindictive toward her, supposedly wants her stripped of her title as a condition of divorce. Diana, ever the inspired one-upman, has let it be known that she might prefer the title to which she was born, Lady Diana Spencer. The Economist makes a suggestion sure to cause yelps at court: if people question whether Charles is fit to rule, then have a referendum on the subject. This recommendation is tied to a call for constitutional reform, and the Economist quotes Prince Philip's recent remark that a republic was "a perfectly reasonable alternative" to a constitutional monarchy.

Polls show that 75% of Britons support the continuation of the monarchy (down 10% from a decade ago). That is enough for the Windsors to work with if they can establish some decorum within their ranks. Auberon Waugh, always a mischiefmaker, thanked the royals in a recent edition of the Telegraph for "the diversion they bring into our humdrum lives as we follow their ups and downs, triumphs and disasters ... we can honestly say we love them all, each in a different way." He has a point. The appeal of this unscripted soap opera should not be ignored. But in the long run, the royals will lose out by counting on it.

With reporting by Helen Gibson/London