In the years to come, when historians come to unravel the chain of events that led to the downfall of the House of Windsor, perhaps they will pay particular attention to this book. Finding Freedom purports to be the first proper attempt to tell the truth about “Megxit”: how the Duke and Duchess of Sussex went from the golden couple who were going to modernise the monarchy for a new, emotionally literate, socially aware generation, to the pair who found their lives so filled with misery and rancour that they ran away to California.
It is quite a journey. It takes us from Meghan landing in London in June 2016 when, apparently, she was a woman on a mission, not to bag herself a prince, but to go shoe shopping. Off she goes to Selfridges, where she enjoyed looking at her favourite designers, including Stella McCartney, Chloe and Marc Jacobs.
In between shopping trips she is networking. Within a few days she is set up on a blind date with Prince Harry. “Do you know what you’re letting yourself in for?” her London agent asks over lunch.
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“Well, it’s going to be an experience,” Meghan says. “And at least it will be a fun night.”
Meghan was right in one respect: the evening did go well. They chatted for nearly three hours, over beer for him, martini for her; he spoke about his charity work, she talked about her rescue dogs. There was no goodbye kiss, but the romance was on; by the time she was back in her hotel, Harry was already texting her.
Meghan did not know what she was letting herself in for. There were warning signs early on, when Harry was so furious with what he saw as the racism and sexism in the tabloid coverage of his romance that he issued an angry statement condemning the “abuse and harassment” of Meghan. Prince Charles was on tour in the Middle East, and had only 20 minutes’ notice of Harry’s incendiary statement. He was not best pleased. It was another harbinger of how Harry and Meghan would come to fall out with the other royal households.
By the time Meghan was pregnant with Archie, it was not short of all-out war. According to the authors, Omid Scobie and Carolyn Durand, senior courtiers in other households — the “men in grey suits” — were intent on reining in Harry and Meghan’s global popularity.
Who are these men in grey suits? It is never clear. They are not named. But they are a bad lot, it seems. The “establishment” even feared that Harry and Meghan’s popularity “might eclipse that of the royal family itself”. Really?
At this point the reader might ask: what exactly were these rotters doing? And how do we know? Scobie and Durand do not claim to have had interviews with Harry and Meghan, but they have spoken to them. They have also been introduced, with the help of the couple’s staff, to Harry and Meghan’s closest friends.
The result is that we get the pure, undiluted voice of H and M (as their staff call them). That makes this book an important contribution to the understanding of the biggest crisis in the royal family for more than 20 years. However, it is not necessarily an edifying experience, or indeed a reliable narrative. The main complaint, as far as one can tell, is that the Sussexes sometimes had to take a back seat in the royal pecking order.
Did no one explain to Meghan that Charles is the heir to the throne and William the next in line? And that the concept of monarchy is built on the notion of hierarchy? If not, it was a woeful omission.
There are attempts at balance, as when it is conceded that the way Harry and Meghan announced their plans to step down caused ill will. Yet when Meghan is quoted as saying things such as, “I gave up my entire life for this family. I was willing to do whatever it takes,” one has to wonder about her capacity for self-awareness.
This is not to say that they weren’t genuinely unhappy, or that they did not feel unprotected by the Palace. They did. But this book has only one story to tell: how Harry and Meghan are the innocent victims of a wicked Palace and an even more wicked media, and it’s all everyone else’s fault. It cries out for a decent account of how things really fell apart.
The prose has its Mills & Boon moments. We learn that when Meghan moved in with Harry she immediately felt at home because “she’s always been able to bloom where she was planted”. When Harry took Meghan to Zambia, she “stretched her body into the perfect warrior pose”, which as well as being irrelevant raises the question: how did the authors know which yoga pose Meghan chose to adopt? Other than by her telling them?
Worst of all, on the evening she first visited Harry at Kensington Palace, we read that he was “every bit the gentleman” who would always gesture for her to go first. “The short walk from the living room would have been no different.” Please: too much information.
On and on it goes, detail after exhausting detail. There are some exclusive nuggets, such as the fact that they got engaged several weeks earlier than anyone realised. The name of their labrador, kept a secret for so long, is Pula.
However, for a book that sets out to put the record straight, there are curious omissions. There is nothing on the controversy over why they refused to divulge the names of Archie’s godparents, or what happened when she had an apparent meltdown on an official engagement in a market in Fiji. Their decision to set up their Megxit website on the sly without telling any of the royal family is skimmed over.
Some of it is just plain wrong. When they flew to Canada to get away from everyone in November last year, it wasn’t on Air Canada, as the authors claim, but a private jet (whoops). The authors use a couple of jobs undertaken by the couple to berate the press, complaining that coverage of their first trip to Wales omitted to point out that the reason they were an hour late was because their train was delayed. Not true: every newspaper said that their train was late. Instead of the couple being “pummeled with criticism”, the coverage was overwhelmingly positive. The Daily Mail, bete noire for Harry and Meghan, said she passed her initiation “with flying colours”.
A few days later she wore a trouser suit to an awards ceremony. The book says she was “lambasted” for her fashion choice — in fact, she was widely praised. Laziness by the authors, who could have checked? Or cynicism?
Harry and Meghan had so much to offer. He was a popular and charming member of the royal family, with a drive and a sincerity that reached parts other royals never could. Meghan had glamour, intelligence, initiative and a fresh approach that could have transformed the monarchy. They could have done so much, which is why their departure was such a loss. They deserve a better account than this.
Finding Freedom: Harry and Meghan and the Making of a Modern Royal Family, by Omid Scobie and Carolyn Durand (HQ, 368pp)
The Times
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https://news.google.com/__i/rss/rd/articles/CBMie2h0dHBzOi8vd3d3LnRoZWF1c3RyYWxpYW4uY29tLmF1L3dvcmxkL3RoZS10aW1lcy9hdC1sYXN0LXRoZS10cnV0aC1iZWhpbmQtbWV4aXQvbmV3cy1zdG9yeS9lNjI2ZGUwNzU5OGMxYWNjNmUzZDY1YTVhNjU4ZjhhNdIBAA?oc=5
2020-08-01 07:36:00Z
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