After years of being portrayed as Britain’s most hated woman, Camilla, the second wife of King Charles, was crowned queen on Saturday, marking a remarkable shift in popular acceptance that few expected.
When Charles’s ex-wife, the glamorous and hugely popular Princess Diana, died in an accident in Paris in 1997, most of the media’s hostility was directed at Camilla. Some predicted the impossibility of Charles and Camilla’s marriage.
But they married eight years later, and since then she has been recognized, albeit reluctantly by some, as a key member of the royal family, as someone the new king relied heavily on, and as queen of the country.
“She is his soul mate,” said Robert Hardiman, a longtime royal correspondent and author of The Queen of Our Time, noting that she has been married to Charles longer than Diana.
Camilla Shand was born in 1947 into a wealthy family. Her father was a major in the army and a wine merchant who married an aristocratic woman. Camilla’s social circles brought her into contact with Charles, whom she met on the polo field in the early 1970s.
The two dated for some time and Charles had considered marriage, but felt he was too young to take such a big step.
Charles entered the Navy, and Camilla married a cavalry officer, Brigadier Andrew Parker Bowles. Camilla and her husband had two children, Tom and Laura, and they divorced in 1995.
As for Charles, he married Diana, who was only 20 years old, in a wedding in 1981 that enchanted not only Britain but the entire world. After having two children, William and Harry, the relationship worsened and they separated in 1996 after he renewed his relationship with his former lover.
The details of this affair were presented to a stunned public in 1993 when a transcript of a private conversation, secretly recorded in very intimate detail, was published in the press.
“I would do anything for you,” Camilla told Charles in the secretly recorded phone conversation published in 1993. “This is love. This is the power of love.”
In a television interview the following year, Charles admitted that he had resumed their relationship, but said that it did not happen until after his marriage had irrevocably broken down.
“There were three of us in this marriage, so it was a bit crowded,” Diana said in a TV interview in 1995.
And after Diana added brilliance to Windsor Castle with her elegant clothes, many Britons did not understand why Charles preferred the country-loving Camilla, who usually appeared in a scarf and a waterproof coat.
“I can’t imagine anyone of sound mind leaving you to go to Camilla,” Prince Philip, Charles’s father and late husband of Queen Elizabeth, said in a letter to Diana.
focus of criticism
In the midst of overwhelming public grief and anger after Diana’s death, Camilla in particular came under heavy criticism. But in subsequent years, royal aides, tasked with re-polishing the tarnished reputation of the royal family as a whole, slowly began integrating Camilla into a more public role.
The success was achieved after the couple were able to appear in public together, then they got married and Queen Elizabeth agreed last year that Camilla would bear the title of Queen Consort.
Public relations experts say it was the result of hard and meticulous work, although aides said it was mainly due to Camilla’s personality and great sense of humor.
Fiona Shelburne, 75, the Marquess of Lansdowne, who is close to Camilla, told the Sunday Times newspaper last month: “She’s strong, and she’s been brought up with this extraordinary sense of duty… Wherever you go don’t complain, put on your best face and carry on… and that puts her in good shape.” very”.
But their incorporation into this mode came at a price. In his memoirs, Prince Harry, the youngest son of Charles, accused his stepmother of leaking stories about him to the press to improve her reputation, and stated that he and his brother asked their father not to marry her.
Opinion polls also indicate that she is not widely popular either. A YouGov poll this week revealed that 48 percent have a positive view of her and 39 percent have a negative opinion of her, making her among the least popular of the royal family.
Other polls also indicated that only a minority thought she should be Queen Camilla.
