Sixty-five years is a life time. And to be a reigning Queen and still going strong no mean feat—the longest serving Monarch ever. The retirement age for us mere mortals is 60 plus unless one of course is a Professor Emeritus or Mahathir Mohamad, is the time a Retirement Party is thrown together with half of the office grudgingly pooling in their share for the pot-luck.
Speeches are delivered with a good dose of premature nostalgia made for the “soon to hang up his boots” person followed by drinks and dinner. The finale: the freshly anointed retiree packed off with a memento in hand honouring his 35 odd years in office. Queen Elizabeth, grandmother to the newly married Prince Harry, bestowed now by her the title Duke of Sussex with wife Meghan being the Duchess, but of course, has in her reign witnessed outnumbered, countless happenings, been the subject of innumerous scandalous stories brought on by her brood or their royal spouses, and yet with quiet dignity dusted them off, and moved on to attend some milestone proceedings.
She was just 25 when she became Queen after King George VI, her Papa, succumbed to lung cancer. He never wanted to become the King but greatness, as one all knows, was thrust upon him by his brother Edward who abdicated the throne for the love of his life, an American, a two time divorcee. A near constitutional crisis occurred in the year of the Lord 1936 almost tantamounting to the toppling of the Monarchy.
Her official coronation took place on June 2nd , 1953 though the King—with his severe stammering and stuttering speech impairment— which was a cause of much anguish to Elizabeth, had passed away on 6 February 1952. This done, because a mourning period was thought befitting, before any celebratory blitheness. (How times have changed… Now holding on to any mourning longer than it takes time to brew a cup of coffee would seem purely a waste of time!).
The Duke of Edinburgh clearly resented having to play second fiddle to the Crown and when, if my sequencing is correct, the dictates of the Monarchy declared their children could not bear the surname “Mountbatten” and had to take on “Windsor”, the Queen’s marriage would have gone with the wind had she not in a special, unexampled ceremony crowned him “Prince”. For them to go on as a serving couple. Unfortunately, we must fast-forward leaving so very much unsaid but…but 900 words is insufficient space to tell a tale royale.
In July 1981, Prince Charles wed Lady Diana Spencer in a spectacular ceremony and the regal service, with its marvellous pageantry was watched by a mesmerised world. One convent school in Simla set up a large screen projector for the girls, dressed in their knee-grazing grey skirts, socks pulled way up the skirt to appear as stockings, pig-tailed hair, doubly looped in red ribbons, for them to see what magic was made of. A Post-Raj Hangover?! Methinks not—globalisation, coined much later; this, globalised grandeur where in a third world (developing countries, not yet in usage) TVs were few and rare and neighbours would descend without a thought on proud telly owners. Celebratory festivity or being able to attend the gala wedding as one of the honourable guests in the same capacity… Prince Charles was not in love with Diana but his grand uncle Lord Mountbatten thought of her as “a sweet charactered girl”. The Queen found her “irresistibly charming” and it was high-time for the 32 year old Prince to settle down! One of the ordinances in the rule-book of the Monarchy was that the bride had to be a virgin. And so Diana was…confirmed doubly by medical examination! Diana and Charles were incompatible—many public spiteful spats much to the acute discomfort of the Queen: Princess Diana posing alone and desolate in front of the Taj, the eternal symbol of love, averting her face, when on the same trip Charles wanted to peck a ceremoniously protocol decreed kiss on her cheek after winning a Polo match, her rather public fondness for James Hewitt, her bodyguard, Andrew Morton’s 1992 explosive book, Diana, Her True Story which washed and hung to dry all the unimaginable mucky laundry of the royal family, Charles’ conversation with Camilla caught over radio waves telling her his own directives were to live the role of a tampon inside her, the fire in Buckingham Palace. Annus Horribilis—that is what the Queen said of 1992.
“1992, not a year which I shall look back with undiluted pleasure’’, she stiffly announced. Was this not the 40th year of her accession?! Pulling out, at this point, a tissue in this blustery storm skimpily sparse! In 1997, the world awoke to the inconceivably heart-stopping news that the Princess, stripped of her HRH title post divorce, had died in a car crash. Britain, to say the least, went berserk; the stiff upper lip history, floods of tears deluging Kensington and beyond, demanding the Queen to come down from her “throne”, bringing down the flag to half-mast. England’s “Queen of Hearts”, “The People’s Princess”, needed to be at long last accorded her due.
Elizabeth bowed to her country’s wishes, acknowledging times had changed. (Prince William and Kate, the staid couple, believing a third child would provide the traditional balance—a contemporary comfort duvet.) Spunky Harry’s nuptials to non-conformist Meghan a fairy tale, which the astro-stars shall ensure remains one. Above all the Queen has played the role of a common indulgent grandma as far as this union goes…
She is living history of adapting, accepting the new order while traditionally commencing the resetting of a new dawn with modernity. Elizabeth, now Lilibet, for not only her own family, but the commonwealth.
Dr Renée Ranchan writes on socio-psychological issues, quasi-political matters and concerns that touch us all