Diana Spencer has been dead for 20 years. I was a journalist on the Evening Standard in those days and she came to lunch at the newspaper a few months before she died. Apart from her blinding charm, and her overwhelming beauty, it was her perfect manners which were striking. She mastered a few details about anyone she met, so that they always felt she was interested in them. It is a great gift. I do not go in for meeting famous people, but that lunch was something very special. I went home in a blaze of love which has lasted to this hour. Conservative-minded people feared her because she wanted to upset the apple cart. She certainly did. It is strange that after she had done so, and there were bruised Granny Smiths all over the street, the monarchy was more popular than it had ever been. I was among those buttoned-up people who winced recently when her sons emoted about their grief. Then I remembered her, and realised I was wrong to wince. There is nothing wrong with admitting to heartbreak. The monarchy exercises a role in public life which is difficult to define, but Diana certainly expanded that role. The paradox is that, by causing the Establishment such embarrassment, she actually strengthened the monarchy. Strength is made perfect in weakness. Our love of the Queen herself is not a thing of the head, but of the heart.
Finished copies of my new book, Charles Darwin: Victorian Mythmaker, have arrived from the printers. A new book always fills the author with a mixture of emotions. Pleasure predominates, but there is also the fear that reviewers will not like it. There are so many fundamentalist Darwinian bigots at large.
Comments
Join the debate for just £1 a month
Be part of the conversation with other Spectator readers by getting your first three months for £3.
UNLOCK ACCESS Just £1 a monthAlready a subscriber? Log in