Letters: Slimming down the monarchy will only hasten its decline

Royal travails

Sir: The travails of the royal family outlined by Penny Junor (‘In check’, 18 January) may be public theatre but that does not make the suggestion to ‘slim down’ the monarchy any less dangerous. It might be farce now but it could turn to tragedy.

Remember King Lear, where Goneril and Regan use Lear’s rowdy night in the castle as a pretext to begin robbing him of his knights and independence, leaving him destitute and mad. ‘What need you five and 20, or ten, or five, to follow in a house where twice so many have a command to tend you? What need one?’

An embarrassing time for royals in the media prompts calls to retrench the monarchy, but once you take something you set up the trend of taking more, to the end of leaving the institution wholly at the mercy of a greater number of insincere politicians who see bleating to the press about royal economy as a cynical way of advancing their own careers.