"I feel really let down."
With those five words, Prince Harry revealed to the world that it was his relationship with Prince Charles that had suffered the most in the fallout of the couple's decision to step away from the royal family.
In his sit-down with Oprah, the Duke of Sussex said he had felt that way because his father had "been through something similar" and he had perhaps wanted a little more from a man who "knows what pain feels like".
"I will always love him but there's a lot of hurt that's happened," he said.
It was an unexpectedly emotional glimpse into the typically stoic dynamics of the British royal family, who live by the mantra "never complain, never explain".
But the relationship between Prince Charles and Harry was complicated even before his son was born.
According to Harry's mother Diana, her husband yearned for their second child to be a girl and claimed he was disappointed to find out it was a baby boy. After that, "something inside me closed off".
Reuters: Hugh Peralta
)She later described Harry's birth as the moment their marriage ended.
"It just went bang, our marriage. The whole thing went down the drain," she claimed.
Harry and Charles's close years
Charles has never responded to Diana's allegations, and it's clear he went on to enjoy a close, if sometimes contentious, relationship with his second-born.
The death of Diana forged a strong bond between them, according to Prince Harry.
"He was there for us, he was the one out of two left and he tried to do his best and to make sure we were protected and looked after," he said in a BBC documentary in 2017.
The sons supported his marriage to Camilla, helping to usher in a period of stability for the House of Windsor after years of turmoil.
Reuters
)"People see William and Harry as surrogates for their mother, and the expectation was after her death they would continue the battle on her behalf," royal biographer Robert Lacey told Reuters two years after the wedding.
"They have turned out to be 100 per cent Windsors, incredibly supportive of Charles.
"You almost forget the potential conflict that exists between father and growing sons."
Charles's struggle to capture the magic of the House of Windsor
Along with being a potential source of conflict with his sons, the breakdown of Charles's marriage to Princess Diana plagued the man who would one day be king.
Princess Diana was beloved by the Commonwealth, where members chanted for her appearance on royal tours, while Charles had always had a complicated relationship with the people he would one day rule.
There were claims he was jealous of his wife's popularity, which were eventually supported by Diana herself.
Reuters
)"We'd be going around Australia, for instance, and all you could hear was, 'Oh, she's on the other side,'" she told the BBC's Martin Bashir in her 1995 interview.
Diana won people over with her dedication to humanitarian work and warmth with the public, while Prince Charles's lifestyle and views often placed him at odds with the rest of the country in the 80s.
The comparison was even more stark between that of mother and son. The Queen is highly regarded in Britain and in the Commonwealth, having heralded a second Elizabethan age through decades of steady leadership.
Prince Charles, on the other hand, was viewed differently. In his unauthorised biography of Charles, writer Tom Bower described the heir to the throne as a lover of luxury whose stubborn streak could risk the institution itself.
While he acknowledged the prince as intelligent, kind and sensitive, he also suggested that Charles was "very keen to criticise others but cannot tolerate those who challenge him".
"He's a person who is driven, who undoubtedly wants to do good but doesn't understand that the consequences of a lot of his actions cause a lot of trouble and he doesn't like to be told that he might be doing something wrong," Mr Bower told Reuters.
A better era of stability with the British public
A poll in January 2018 found only 9 per cent picked Charles as among their favourite royals.
But since the turn of the century, the future King has had more success in winning over some of the public.
Chris Jackson/Pool Photo via AP
)He has enjoyed a stable 15-year marriage to the love of his life, and became a grandfather several times over.
The issues he has held dear for decades, including climate change, organic farming and alternative medicine, are far more mainstream concepts these days.
And in the first few years of Prince Harry's relationship with Meghan, the narrative embraced by the tabloids was that Charles was her biggest supporter.
He reportedly gave her the nickname "Tungsten" after the rare metal because he respected the Duchess of Sussex's strength.
When her relationship with her own father spectacularly collapsed, Charles offered to step in and walk Meghan down the aisle at her wedding.
Amid the fallout over Meghan and Harry's withdrawal from royal life, Charles and his courtiers have insisted the heir was still close to his son and daughter-in-law.
Tabloids reported that Prince Charles was personally covering the cost of their security in Los Angeles, and that his grandson Archie referred to him as "pa" during royal Zoom calls.
It gave the impression of one happy family, albeit separated by thousands of miles in different countries. But from the moment Prince Harry joined Meghan on the couch with Oprah, that facade was broken.
How will the interview reflect on Charles?
Along with claiming that he felt let down by Prince Charles, Harry told Oprah that his father had cut him off financially and didn't return his phone calls after he decided to step back from royal duties.
When pressed on why this happened, Prince Harry suggested it was "because I took matters into my own hands".
Reuters: Phil Harris
)"This is not a surprise to anybody; it's really sad that it's got to this point, but I've got to do something for my own mental health, for my wife's, because I could see where this is headed," he said.
But it was Harry's suggestion that his father and brother are "trapped" in their world that may serve as the biggest blow.
The BBC's royal correspondent Jonny Dymond described it as a "velvet-covered knife" into the heart of the modern monarchy.
The claims were explosive, but how this will impact Charles's standing with the British public remains to be seen. So far, he is keeping mum about the interview.
As he left a vaccination centre in London on Tuesday, the Prince was asked what he thought. Charles stopped and looked up, reporters say, but then turned and walked off.
In the only statement so far issued by the royal household, the Queen said "the whole family is saddened to learn the full extent of how challenging the last few years have been for Harry and Meghan".
The head of the family fared much better in the interview than her son. The Duke and Duchess of Sussex had nothing but kind words for the monarch and appeared to be on good terms with the Queen.
"She's my colonel-in-chief, right? She always will be," Prince Harry said.
Reuters: Sang Tan
)He was also keen to ensure the Queen and Prince Philip were not accused of being the unnamed royal who voiced concerns about his son Archie's skin tone.
But he left the rest of his family, including his father, under a cloud of suspicion.
After spending years clawing his way back into the good graces of the British public, Prince Charles has once again been cast in an unfavourable light — this time by his own son.
That may not have been his intention — Harry said he would continue to make it "one of my priorities to try and heal that relationship" — but even so, the seed had been sown.
For a man who admires Shakespeare, it would be hard for Prince Charles not to see the bard's themes in this latest family drama.
His life has been defined by power and tragedy and family rivalries.
And now in his final act as the king in waiting, he may have been damaged by a prince in self-imposed exile: His own son.
Reuters: Hugo Burnand
)https://news.google.com/__i/rss/rd/articles/CBMibmh0dHBzOi8vd3d3LmFiYy5uZXQuYXUvbmV3cy8yMDIxLTAzLTE0L2hhcnJ5LW1lZ2hhbi1pbnRlcnZpZXctcmV2ZWFscy1jaGFybGVzLWFuZC1oaXMtc29uLWFyZS1hdC1vZGRzLzEzMjM0Nzkw0gEnaHR0cHM6Ly9hbXAuYWJjLm5ldC5hdS9hcnRpY2xlLzEzMjM0Nzkw?oc=5
2021-03-13 19:21:39Z
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