Fairies, Kings, and Queens
Last Friday there was yet another school shooting in the United States, this time in a town next to Houston. Again, access to automatic weapons and a culture of fixing problems with a bullet led to the death of ten people. On Friday there was an airplane crash in Havanna. It was the largest crash in number of victims since the late eighties. Over a hundred dead showed up the aging fleet of the Cuban airlines; the plane was forty years old. Yesterday the biggest news story was neither of these. Rather, an American actress marrying a British prince made all the reporters swoon.
There is, always has been, and seemingly always will be, a fascination with royalty. Everyone dreams of being a prince or princess when they're young. Movies go wild on the theme of a commoner meeting generally the prince of their dreams. But the fascination is with an idea of royalty, an idea of perfection that doesn't exist. In The Prince and the Pauper, Tom Canty realized that Prince Edward's life wasn't so great, after all. Except for the food, of course. Prince Edward also learned that the commoners didn't exactly live like him.
Glory, honor, chivalry, adventure, are all on display as Rudolf Rassendyll fights for his lookalike to claim his throne and his bride. Here, royalty is seen as the embodiment of nobility of spirit. Rassendyll is acclaimed as a commoner that is an example of true royalty by his actions, yet must remain outside it. Duty is seen as the cement that binds royalty together, and which keeps the outsiders in their place, and yet tied to the monarch in their observance of it.
British royalty has been helped since Queen Elizabeth, as Princess Elizabeth, drove an ambulance in London during the war, rather than be evacuated like so many British children of the city. If the King's children forwent safety to the call of duty, so could many common people trapped in the bombed city. Since then, it has had its ups and downs, but it has never lost its appeal. The fairy tale of a commoner marrying into royalty has come true. Though, to be sure, Kate Middleton and Meghan Markle were not exactly very common commoners, not as much as some of those that married into the Swedish and Norwegian royal houses.
Spain also has a commoner queen. Again, not so common, since her parents were already professionals in the well-paying job sector of journalism. But here, there is not the love and admiration the British royals receive. The Windsors have sat on the throne at least since 1066, though their name has changed through the years, thanks to the addition of different families to the mix and the expedient changing of the surname in World War I to avoid anti-German sentiment. Victoria and her children took on Prince Albert's surname, Saxe-Coburg and Gotha. Victoria's surname was also German, thanks to the German branch of the family being asked to rein in England after the death of childless Queen Anne. George I brought the Hanover name to the monarchy. So, in 1917, George V changed the name to Windsor, the name of one of the family's castles.
While Spain has maintained the name of Borbón, mostly through intermarriage of Borbón cousins, it stopped its continuity in 1931, with the declaration of the Republic. Franco, in his later years, decided to restore the monarchy, claiming his take over had been necessary to maintain order, but that Spain remained a monarchy, including after his death. To that effect he named Juan Carlos I King of Spain upon his death, skipping over Alfonso XIII's son, Juan. Franco's intention was to effectively erase the Republic, by suggesting that things were going back to normal with the crowning of the King.
There are supporters of the monarchy in Spain. But it doesn't have the fairy tale quality of the British Royal Family. Too much has come between the people and the monarchy here. While the old king tried to be just another guy, and his wife, Sophia of Greece, won people over with her manners, it has always seemed a stick-on monarchy. Those who diverge in their opinion and have been given fines and jail sentences for declaring their particular opinion in what would have been a little-popular declaration, would prefer the monarchy to have ended with the fleeing of Alfonso XIII back in 1931. (Let's face it, Valtonyc, before he was known as the rapper condemned to prison for singing a rap song calling for a Kalashnikov to visit the King with, was practically totally unknown outside his own circle.) The seeming disrespect of the Queen toward her mother-in-law, and the tongue lashing of the King against the Catalans, have not served to endear them further to those who were already teetering in their opinion of the necessity of a monarchy in the first place.
It was a fairy tale wedding yesterday. But life, whether in Buckingham Palace, or in the poorest neighborhoods, is not a fairy tale. I hope they have a good life together, but we should recognize that we have an obsession with royalty. Each of us has our own King or Queen of Hearts at home. Our palace is our homes, however humble. That's royalty enough.
There is, always has been, and seemingly always will be, a fascination with royalty. Everyone dreams of being a prince or princess when they're young. Movies go wild on the theme of a commoner meeting generally the prince of their dreams. But the fascination is with an idea of royalty, an idea of perfection that doesn't exist. In The Prince and the Pauper, Tom Canty realized that Prince Edward's life wasn't so great, after all. Except for the food, of course. Prince Edward also learned that the commoners didn't exactly live like him.
Glory, honor, chivalry, adventure, are all on display as Rudolf Rassendyll fights for his lookalike to claim his throne and his bride. Here, royalty is seen as the embodiment of nobility of spirit. Rassendyll is acclaimed as a commoner that is an example of true royalty by his actions, yet must remain outside it. Duty is seen as the cement that binds royalty together, and which keeps the outsiders in their place, and yet tied to the monarch in their observance of it.
British royalty has been helped since Queen Elizabeth, as Princess Elizabeth, drove an ambulance in London during the war, rather than be evacuated like so many British children of the city. If the King's children forwent safety to the call of duty, so could many common people trapped in the bombed city. Since then, it has had its ups and downs, but it has never lost its appeal. The fairy tale of a commoner marrying into royalty has come true. Though, to be sure, Kate Middleton and Meghan Markle were not exactly very common commoners, not as much as some of those that married into the Swedish and Norwegian royal houses.
Spain also has a commoner queen. Again, not so common, since her parents were already professionals in the well-paying job sector of journalism. But here, there is not the love and admiration the British royals receive. The Windsors have sat on the throne at least since 1066, though their name has changed through the years, thanks to the addition of different families to the mix and the expedient changing of the surname in World War I to avoid anti-German sentiment. Victoria and her children took on Prince Albert's surname, Saxe-Coburg and Gotha. Victoria's surname was also German, thanks to the German branch of the family being asked to rein in England after the death of childless Queen Anne. George I brought the Hanover name to the monarchy. So, in 1917, George V changed the name to Windsor, the name of one of the family's castles.
While Spain has maintained the name of Borbón, mostly through intermarriage of Borbón cousins, it stopped its continuity in 1931, with the declaration of the Republic. Franco, in his later years, decided to restore the monarchy, claiming his take over had been necessary to maintain order, but that Spain remained a monarchy, including after his death. To that effect he named Juan Carlos I King of Spain upon his death, skipping over Alfonso XIII's son, Juan. Franco's intention was to effectively erase the Republic, by suggesting that things were going back to normal with the crowning of the King.
There are supporters of the monarchy in Spain. But it doesn't have the fairy tale quality of the British Royal Family. Too much has come between the people and the monarchy here. While the old king tried to be just another guy, and his wife, Sophia of Greece, won people over with her manners, it has always seemed a stick-on monarchy. Those who diverge in their opinion and have been given fines and jail sentences for declaring their particular opinion in what would have been a little-popular declaration, would prefer the monarchy to have ended with the fleeing of Alfonso XIII back in 1931. (Let's face it, Valtonyc, before he was known as the rapper condemned to prison for singing a rap song calling for a Kalashnikov to visit the King with, was practically totally unknown outside his own circle.) The seeming disrespect of the Queen toward her mother-in-law, and the tongue lashing of the King against the Catalans, have not served to endear them further to those who were already teetering in their opinion of the necessity of a monarchy in the first place.
It was a fairy tale wedding yesterday. But life, whether in Buckingham Palace, or in the poorest neighborhoods, is not a fairy tale. I hope they have a good life together, but we should recognize that we have an obsession with royalty. Each of us has our own King or Queen of Hearts at home. Our palace is our homes, however humble. That's royalty enough.
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