Elizabeth II
is now that peaceful incarnation. The proof that a young woman without any experience or diploma can, by chance alone, climb the steps of power four by four and break, however high, the baccarat ceiling. For the noble purpose of recovering her prize in the primogeniture lottery.
In the ruthless world of public appearances, she knew how to master the codes, if not dress codes — her acidulous wardrobe attracting arrogant jeers to her — at least those of a cuckoo clock when it came to slipping metronomically into the balcony and wave her arm before returning to have the mechanism oiled.
Some whisper in the embrasures of the imposing windows to have seen her surprise her slippers elsewhere than in their place designated by an equally oiled protocol. Which inevitably made her grand chamberlain fly off the handle, go into a spin to enter into an anger stifled only by the immensity of a damp palace with tired furniture, open to all drafts and opprobrium.
Coming from a line more accustomed to shortening heads, impaling remains or more recently decimating battalions of pachyderms,
Elizabeth
enjoyed only the company of her last corgis and her barrack-room humorist whom she married for, on the spot… relegate him two steps behind her.
As a little girl, she dreamed of being an actress. Ironically, her wish was granted.
Elizabeth ii’s first role will be unchanging, uniform and relentless, regardless of setting or partners. The ceremonial role of a constitutional monarch whose scenario did not provide the shadow of a piece of an executive power. The end of her career was, however, an opportunity to prove her talents as a stuntwoman. Aren't the royal dynasties the last great silent film stars?
In the days of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, her ancestors were more talkative, their courts more cruel and their legions bloodthirsty. But we must do them justice: to go and slay a few Frenchmen across the Channel at the end of the week, they did not incur any debts and paid all their suppliers in cash, by means indeed of booty and ransoms with which they overwhelmed the surrounding peoples.
Nowadays, to admire such brilliant epics, you have to subscribe to Netflix.
The monarchs of that time had their swords on edge and washed their hands regularly twice a month. They often died as a result of their first bath and pushed the luxury so far as to use pocket handkerchiefs. The upheavals of history subsequently forced them to make some adjustments, among other things fiscal, with this so British phlegm that makes them show politeness and delicacy at the slightest disaster, at the slightest disgrace.
So in
1992, this royal continuum was put to the test. The couple from Wales are tearing themselves apart in the pages of bestsellers. The London tabloids make their headlines and trumpet their separation. A fire broke out in November at Windsor Castle, fueled by piles of filthy books and newspapers bought by the family.
Annus Horribilis
according to the queen because the same year Prince
Andrew
and Princess
Anne
separated from their halves. Panicked follicles should not be long to start harassing Prince
Edward,
Elizabeth’s fourth and last child.
They will have to wait until
1996
and the divorce of
Charles
and
Diana
turns to tragedy the following year with the death in Paris of the
Princess of hearts. As the crowd pays homage to her in front of Buckingham Palace, we easily suspect Prince
Philip
yelling, exasperated by his family:
“Which of you, bunch of wimps, will go and pay homage to her?”
At these electrifying words, the queen and her children, as one man… would have maintained the deepest silence. Seeing the gates of the palace come to life dangerously,
Elizabeth
had her grand chamberlain apply some poultices which were sorely needed. After an appropriate
“Thank you, my grand”
she had the drawbridge lowered, half-moved by curiosity for an indulgent condolence card among the flowers.
The last Windsorian earthquakes would again concern
Andrew
and her favourite,
Harry. The first, for a debauchery after all quite shared, but with a sulphurous host in the company of a very young blonde who became frightened once becoming an adult. The second confessed quite soon a penchant for girls smelling of grease and the hops between nazi-like buddies.
Granny, whom these wanderings displeased, excommunicated him. Which had no more effect on her grandson than if someone had come to tell him that his fish and chips had been served. Another bumpy year, she sighed, waving to the crowd from an increasingly bare balcony.
In an empire on which the sky never clears,
Elizabeth
still found the strength to go around, followed by fifteen thousand dozen kilos of luggage in which sat a little chamberlain. Thus in
2011
she offered herself a trip to Ireland, the first of a British monarch in a century, to put an end to a quarrel of religion or for a question of party wall. We never really knew.
Multiplying clothing symbols, her only free expression, she imagined with the help of an Irish dressmaker a most piercing bundle: a dress decorated with
2,091
hand-sewn shamrocks, hats with green feathers, an Irish harp brooch, maids of honour in
50
shades of green. A tailor-made empathy that she would have been well advised later to show at the death of a princess mentioned above.
The queen spoke a convolution in perfect Gaelic, regretting the way Britain had made Ireland suffer, but forgetting that the Tommies had made this dialect all but disappear. Eight small centuries of bloodshed and hatred, ravaged by sinister famines, pockmarked by a
Bloody Sunday
when in
1972
British forces killed
14
innocent civilians. And punctuated by the astounding attack in
1979
in which her cousin
Lord Mountbatten
and his
14-year-old grandson died.
While former
i.r.a.
in power today would have preferred to wait another century, by the time the visit was over, the Irish had melted. They called
Elizabeth
their
prodigal mother,
Liz, and some even waved Union Jacks. As time went on and victimization became a trend, the latest avatar of nepotism and colonialism unchained a creeping admiration for her stoicism, as isolated as she was from her people as the dean of beasts from visitors in a wildlife park.
Elizabeth
retired to Balmoral, her summer retreat, where her health rapidly deteriorated. She leaves unfinished a Yorkshire pudding and an heir whose ears have been ready for ages to make him take off from the family cocoon. The queen dies at the age of
96 from the fear of not entering the Guinness record of the longest reign. She showed no regrets after her death.