Felipe's funeral: this was the nostalgic and sad reunion of William and Harry
The fights between the two children of Princess Diana have been the talk of the media in this 2021, but they come from long ago. The young men walked separately behind their grandfather's coffin.
When Meghan and Harry gave their explosive interview with Oprah, it was said that the gulf that had been created between Harry and his brother William would take months or perhaps years to close. The rebellious son of Lady Di shook the monarchy by hurling accusations left and right, but in the heart of William he witnessed a certain stab.
The young heir to the throne is perhaps the best representative that the British monarchy has today and in turn its great defender. With the perfect look of him he has symbolized the Windsor legacy for years. Harry, however, said things that day that were difficult to forgive. He claimed that his brother was "trapped" in the Palace. His wife Meghan, in turn, painted Kate as a witch who had made her cry.
The fight would have gone on for a long time had it not been for a sad event: the death of his grandfather, the Duke of Edinburgh. With that news, Harry had to return to London. The young man's presence was so strained in royalty that several things happened. The first that Queen Elizabeth to avoid a humiliation to her grandson banned military uniforms, since Harry, already stripped of her titles, cannot use it. The second that the decision was made that Harry will not go after his grandfather's coffin with William. Between the two brothers was their cousin Peter Phillips.
The photo of the brothers walking after their grandfather's coffin thus became one of the postcards on Saturday. The two of them walked slowly but at a distance from the Land Rover that his grandfather designed for his own funeral.
An old fight
In the UK they have a somewhat derogatory term for the younger brother of an heir to the throne: "the spare". The expression perfectly describes the role of these princes: they prepare their older brothers all their lives to reign, but they remain in the background, in case something extraordinary happens.
This situation usually generates friction between them. King George VI, Queen Elizabeth's father, never forgave Edward, his older brother, who had resigned from the Crown, leaving him with the unexpected responsibility of leading his country in a world war. And The Crown, the Netflix series, has shown the disagreements between the current queen and her sister, Princess Margaret.
With William and Harry, the children of Prince Charles and Lady Di, things always seemed different. The tragic death of their mother and the images of them growing up together suggested that they had very deep ties. But what happened in the last two years denied the pink version: today they are estranged, hardly speak to each other and, according to Battle of Brothers, the book by Robert Lacey, royal historian and consultant to The Crown, their fight is "the deepest conflict seen in royalty in several generations ”.
The book has a hypothesis. He says that it is true that their conflict broke out when Harry married Meghan Markle, but he warns that since childhood they had disagreements almost in everything. "The two represent contradictions that go back to his childhood and even to the divorce of his parents", explained the author to the magazine "People". All because William, future king, has always been more attached to the institution and its rules, while Harry has been more rebellious and critical.
William and Harry seemed like two brothers with a bond difficult to break, especially since the tragic death of their mother, Lady Di.
Although they always had opposite attitudes, that had never been a problem. It is true that Harry used to get into trouble for his teenage craziness, such as taking nude photos with friends or appearing dressed as a Nazi on Halloween, but William - much calmer - had always been there for him.
Harry himself explained it once, when he spoke of the mental problems that remained after the death of Princess Diana: “I was very close to a nervous breakdown on several occasions, but my brother, God bless him, was a great support for me ”.
Harry had the first brush with his brother in 2017 when he told him that there were serious plans with Meghan and he told him not to rush so much.
That did not change with the arrival of Kate Middleton to the life of William. In fact, the opposite happened: Harry became so attached to the couple that the British press spoke of a fantastic threesome. However, everything indicates that by then he was already feeling disoriented and sad. His brother and his sister-in-law were shaping up for a safe destiny on the throne. But he, like all ‘spare parts’, only saw one unknown in his future and did not finish finding his place.
His discontent crystallized when he appeared with Meghan Markle. In fact, Harry had the first brush with her brother in 2017 when he told her that he was dating her and told her that things seemed serious. William did not support it. Rather, he asked her to take things slow and slow down. Harry was offended and moved on with their relationship. A short time later, he announced his wedding plans.
The marriage did not calm things down. The royal family did their best to welcome Meghan, but misunderstandings soon began, especially with Kate Middleton. In the first disagreement between the two about the dresses that the little girls should wear to the wedding, Kate left crying. In the interview with Oprah, Meghan said that it was the other way around and that it was Kate who made her cry. But she that she then she sent him some flowers with a small card asking for forgiveness.
Then, as both couples lived in the same palace and had the same work team, there were rumors that Meghan treated some of Kate's employees badly and that she even yelled at them.
While William knows that his future is to be king, Harry did not finish finding his place. Those disagreements ended up leaked to the press, which began to show Meghan as a difficult person. Of course, Harry didn't like that.
At that time, in addition, the relationship between the two brothers was going through a bad time. They hardly spoke and only saw each other at public events. Katie Nicholl, a journalist for Vanity Fair, even wrote that Harry had complained to William because he felt he was not doing enough to welcome Meghan into the family. The issue ended up exploding because Harry and Meghan moved to another place, away from William and Kate, and separated their work teams.
To the discomfort of Meghan, who felt harassed by the press and unwelcome by the family, were added Harry's discontent and doubts about his future. His decision to resign from his duties in the royal house, the so-called "megxit", made matters worse, as William only found out an hour before the public.
People close to Harry and Meghan say that at that point things ended up breaking down. Harry was left with the feeling that his brother did not do enough to support him. In addition, he considers unfair the solution offered by his grandmother, and with the support of William: nobody could be only part-time in royalty, and, if he wanted to leave, he had to do it completely.
According to the book, William, who will one day be king, respects traditions and rules much more, unlike his brother. That, however, hadn't been a problem until Meghan's arrival.
In the family, in fact, they are worried that the long-awaited book that will tell the version of Harry and Meghan, which will come out in August, would paint William as the insensitive baddie of the walk. "It could be the most damaging thing for the royal family since the interview in which Princess Diana said that Charles was not qualified to be king," a source told The Sun. Ultimately, the book did not hurt, but Meghan and Harry's interview is compared to that appointment that her mother had with the BBC in which she recounted all her pains and from which royalty may not recover.
