King Charles has, as the British press put it, been dragged into a “war of words” this week with Charles Spencer, the younger brother of the late Princess Diana.
Ahead of the release of Earl Spencer’s bombshell memoir about his sibling next week, titled Swan Song: Diana, My Sister, one particular claim from the book has seemingly thrown the Palace for a loop.
Spencer writes that in the wake of Diana’s 1997 death in a Paris car crash, he recalls the then-Prince of Wales saying: “We’ll forget her soon enough.” The uproar among the British public and press has been fierce, and Charles has been criticized for allegedly making such a cruel comment about his ex-wife, who remains a beloved icon in the U.K. — no matter how unpopular other royals are.
Such is the backlash that the Palace has made a rare public statement over the matter, where the firm appears to cast doubt on Spencer’s recollection of the event: “While we do not comment on books as a matter of principle, His Majesty is mindful that the pain of fraternal grief can cloud reason, affect judgment and colour memory in ways others do not recognise, even many years after such a loss,” it said, per BBC News.
The language, reporters have pointed out, is strikingly similar to Queen Elizabeth’s response to allegations of racism from Prince Harry and Meghan Markle in 2021, when she stated “recollections may vary,” in what was a surprisingly firm response from the monarch.
The latest (and very public) quarrel between King Charles and his former brother-in-law has threatened to loom over a big day for the royal family, with Charles, Prince William and Kate Middleton attending events, as well as Prince Harry’s first major appearance since returning to Britain with Markle.
Spencer’s book has once again unearthed a public sentiment that the royal family are unwilling to show empathy in moments of hardship, especially surrounding Diana’s death. In the released excerpt from the memoir, Spencer claims that Charles unleashed “a stream of anger” over Spencer’s insistence that Diana would not have wanted 15-year-old Prince William and 12-year-old Prince Harry to walk in her funeral procession.
Spencer writes: “[Charles] unleashed down the phone what I have always taken to be his pent-up contempt for Diana, and his horror that the world was so bowled over by her death. ‘Rest assured,’ he hissed, ‘we’ll forget her soon enough’.”
According to the BBC, the Palace refute the claim. They see it as being “entirely out of character for a man with a deeply compassionate nature, who at the time was dealing with his own grief and that of their two sons.”
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