So apparently Prince Charles has been worrying about visiting the US because he faces a “hostile reception from fans of Princess Diana”. “America is Diana country”, according to the Palace. (Story from Daily Express, June 12).
Now, I’m not Charles’s greatest fan, but is anyone else as mystified as me as to why his adulterous, attention-seeking ex-wife is looked upon as something approaching a saint by so many people?
What did the woman actually do, for God’s sake? Sure, she did some PR work for charities (mostly photo-opportunistic work, it has to be said, to allow greater PR for herself). Big deal. Give me tons of money and state-subsidised palaces to live in, and I’ll do some work for charity.
She looked real nice standing next to Charles on my royal weeding coffee mug, and who could ever forget the “termite queen” veil (or do they call it a train?)on lady Di’s wedding gown.
Most of the unwashed heathen American public was clueless to the fact that, as Lady Diana Spencer, she was already mildly royal before the wedding, so they’re seeing that whole Cinderella-story thing.
Prince Charles was a bachelor for a long, long time. He had a whole bunch of girlfriends and there was a great deal of gossip and fooforaw about who he would marry, and she’s the one he picked. Brass ring, baby!
Really pretty.
Transparent dress (anybody else ever see the picture? w00t!).
Because of the above, the normal activities of the Princess of Wales got a great deal more attention in the American press than normal, so the (again, clueless) American Public thought she was doing things differently. I don’t think Princess Anne ever got much exposure for the stuff she did, even when she was the only women at the Olympics not required to get a gender test done.
Friends with Elton John.
Really pretty.
Lots of monarchists here in the states who think royalty might not actually be that bad to have around. As they say in the SCA, “All we want from our kings and queens is something to talk about.” She did that.
Oh, just let me point out that I wasn’t referring specifically to the American public. A huge proportion of the British public also seem to rate her somewhere between Mother Teresa and Florence Nightingale.
(Whole country went potty after she died. Most believable conspiracy theory I’ve heard about her death was that she was run off the road by a convoy of Interflora trucks…)
Alduterous: sure, after Charles carried on a long afair with horse-face and apparently intended to be unfaithful from the start. Attention seeking: she was really shy at first and was hounded by the press from day one. I don’t think she ever had to seek attention, and often went out of her way to avoid it.
I liked Diana because she was the only royal who didn’t have a stick up her ass.
I was 5 when she got married, so I thought she was a fairytale princess who would live happily ever after. Sadly, after she kissed the prince he turned into a toad and took up with the wicked old witch, and Princess Diana’s fairytale turned into a nightmare. Then she got divorced and became a crusader for charities by day, glamour queen by night. And then she died.
Surely there’s nothing more you need to do to become a legend? She’s got the princess thing, the betrayed wife thing, the selfless/virtuous thing, and the forever young thing happening. All that mucky adultery/bulimia/slightly unstable stuff pales into insignificance when put up against the public’s love affair with the tragically dead.
*Almost * right. She died at the right time . She was a figurehead for a “good cause” that was also vaguely anti-USA (landmines), and as has been said, she was pretty. Eh. I agree I don’t understand the urge to make her a saint, but she was OK.
Worrying, isn’t it, how important being pretty is? Speaking as one who cannot be called pretty, I feel remarkably disenfranchised…
I think the icing on the cake, so to speak, was the violence of her death combined with her perceived ‘wholesome’ image. I think it has served to help perpetuate the myth.
Here’s a newsflash: plenty o’ pretty girls die all the time. Anyway, it seems that that is all there is to it. Fortunately most of you Dopers aren’t taken in by the myth. That is A Good Thing.
Ummmm, she really wasn’t all that pretty . . . She had style and glamour (well, she acquired it after her unfortunate early-80s years); she was well-dressed and had a nice figure. But facially, she was no prettier than a dozen girls you’d see on the street every day at lunchtime.