The Guardian (Charlottetown)

The People’s Princess

Princess Diana remembered 20 years after her tragic death in a Paris car crash

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There was a time when scenes like this at London’s Olympic Park would not have happened: Prince William, second in line to the British throne, sprinting down the track with his wife, the Duchess of Cambridge, and his brother, Prince Harry, to the cheers of other runners in a relay race this year promoting mental health.

It was so human. So accessible. So Diana.

Princess Diana, a preschool teacher thrust into the glare of celebrity by her marriage to Prince Charles, dragged Britain’s ribbon-cutting royals into the modern world. She made a direct connection with the public — once running her own race in a flowing white skirt and baggy sweater — and promoted causes far from the mainstream at the time, such as land mine removal and AIDS research.

That link lives on through her two sons, who have adopted their mother’s more personal approach to the monarchy and in the process reinvigora­ted the institutio­n.

“She was the first royal who really took the public’s heart,” said Sandi McDonald, 55, from south London, outside an exhibit of the late princess’s dresses at Kensington Palace. “I think her sons are the same — the public just loves them.”

William and Harry are the most obvious reminder of Diana’s impact. They have spoken openly about their own mental-health issues over losing a parent while so young, and breaking down taboos, just as their mother embraced AIDS patients to ease fears about the disease.

But the princess’s most farreachin­g legacy is her populariza­tion of the idea that celebritie­s can use their ties to millions of people they’ve never met to effect change.

Having been swallowed up by the royal machine when she was barely 20, Diana found her way in life after realizing the public was fascinated by her every thought, says sociologis­t Ellis Cashmore.

Diana was able to manipulate that interest to her own advantage, promoting causes such as land mine clearance and telling her side of the story when her marriage collapsed amid Prince Charles’ relationsh­ip with Camilla Parker Bowles, who later became his second wife.

Today’s celebritie­s in every field have adopted that model — created when newspapers and the evening news were the primary sources of informatio­n — and pumped it full of steroids in the world of Facebook and Instagram.

“You can sort of trace the molecular chain or genetic chain between Diana and Kim Kardashian,” says Cashmore, the author of “Elizabeth Taylor: A Private Life for Public Consumptio­n.” “Imagine if Twitter or Facebook had been around in (Diana’s) day.” Continued on page B5

While every wannabe celebrity today posts their secrets on social media, in the 1990s it was unimaginab­le that a royal would share personal hopes and fears with the world. But trapped in a loveless marriage, Diana chose to take her message to the people who loved her.

She covertly co-operated with biographer Andrew Morton to get her story out, using an intermedia­ry who recorded tapes of her answers to the author’s questions so she could deny ever having spoken with Morton.

“This was a quite remarkable thing that she was doing,” Morton told The Associated Press. “Here she was, talking about the most intimate details of her life — about this woman called Camilla, about her eating disorders, about her half-hearted suicide attempts — to me, who was a relative stranger. … She was talking about things which no princess had ever spoken about before.”

The gamble paid off. Diana’s story was told, and the public loved her all the more. Her funeral featured an unpreceden­ted outpouring of grief and emotion, with tens of thousands lining the streets and mountains of flowers piled outside Kensington Palace. It was a transforma­tive event for both the royal family and for Britain, Morton said.

“No longer were we seen as the stiff-upper-lip, do-nottouch nation,” Morton said. “We were seen as a trembling lower lip (nation), not afraid to emote, to shed our tears in public.”

After Diana’s death, the royals also learned they had to change.

Queen Elizabeth II returned to the capital from vacation in Scotland and gave a speech from Buckingham Palace that quieted days of headlines alleging she had been indifferen­t to Diana’s death. A more accessible monarchy has followed.

Last year, as Britain celebrated the queen’s 90th birthday for months, the queen joked at a street party outside Buckingham Palace that while she appreciate­d the cards and messages, “How I will feel if people are still singing ‘Happy Birthday’ to me in December remains to be seen.”

As William and Harry grew up, they inherited Diana’s ability to communicat­e. To the delight of mental-health charities, they and the Duchess of Cambridge have fronted a campaign to persuade people to open up about mentalheal­th struggles.

One charity, Mind, said the day after Harry spoke about his struggles after his mother’s death, their public inquiry line received a 38 per cent increase in calls.

“It shows how far we have come in changing public attitudes to mental health, that someone so high-profile can open up about something so difficult and personal,” said Paul Farmer, the chief executive of Mind.

The young royals have also brought other luminaries into the conversati­on. In one video, Prince William spoke with pop star Lady Gaga, who told of her struggles with post-traumatic stress disorder.

“(Diana) knew, even from an early age, that she wanted to groom them more in the image of modern princes, that they would be able to reach out to people,” said Morton. “She did not want a … do-not-touch sign over the future of her children.”

Diana also changed the public’s expectatio­ns of national figures, Cashmore argues, saying Britons were no longer satisfied with a distant monarchy. Her sons’ common touch is one reason for the often-denied speculatio­n that William will take the throne after the queen’s death, skipping his less popular father.

Quite simply, Diana changed the royal family, said Jenny Glossop, a fan from Worcesters­hire who visited the Kensington Palace dress exhibit.

“The royals were always formal and stuffy and didn’t have a connection with the public. Diana came along, joined the family and changed the royals forever, because after that even the queen softened, became more approachab­le,” Glossop said. “Her boys have grown to be Diana’s boys. Everything we loved about her carries on in the family.”

 ?? AP FILE PHOTO ?? In this photo from 1997, Britain’s Diana, Princess of Wales, right, chats with 15-year-old landmine victim, Bosnian Muslim girl Mirzeta Gabelic, in front of Mirzeta’s home in Sarajevo, while Diana was on a visit to the region as part of her campaign...
AP FILE PHOTO In this photo from 1997, Britain’s Diana, Princess of Wales, right, chats with 15-year-old landmine victim, Bosnian Muslim girl Mirzeta Gabelic, in front of Mirzeta’s home in Sarajevo, while Diana was on a visit to the region as part of her campaign...
 ?? ISABEL INFANTES/THE ASSOCIATED PRESS ?? People look at messages and flowers attached to the Golden Gates of Kensington Palace in London, ahead of the 20th anniversar­y of Princess Diana’s death. The way Princess Diana died in a high-speed Paris car crash — while she and her boyfriend were...
ISABEL INFANTES/THE ASSOCIATED PRESS People look at messages and flowers attached to the Golden Gates of Kensington Palace in London, ahead of the 20th anniversar­y of Princess Diana’s death. The way Princess Diana died in a high-speed Paris car crash — while she and her boyfriend were...
 ?? AP FILE PHOTO ?? People buy Sunday newspapers reporting the death of Diana, Princess of Wales, on Aug. 31, 1997. The princess, along with her companion, Dodi Fayed, and a driver were killed in a car crash in Paris earlier in the day.
AP FILE PHOTO People buy Sunday newspapers reporting the death of Diana, Princess of Wales, on Aug. 31, 1997. The princess, along with her companion, Dodi Fayed, and a driver were killed in a car crash in Paris earlier in the day.
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 ?? AP FILE PHOTO ?? In this 1987 photo, Britain’s Diana, Princess of Wales smiles as she sits with her sons, princes Harry, front, and William, on the steps of the Royal Palace on the island of Mallorca, Spain, where the British Royal family was on holiday with Spanish...
AP FILE PHOTO In this 1987 photo, Britain’s Diana, Princess of Wales smiles as she sits with her sons, princes Harry, front, and William, on the steps of the Royal Palace on the island of Mallorca, Spain, where the British Royal family was on holiday with Spanish...
 ?? AP FILE PHOTO ?? Prince William, his wife, Kate, and brother, Prince Harry, left, encourage runners at a Heads Together cheering point along the route of the 2017 London Marathon in London. Heads Together is a mental-health charity supported by the three British royals.
AP FILE PHOTO Prince William, his wife, Kate, and brother, Prince Harry, left, encourage runners at a Heads Together cheering point along the route of the 2017 London Marathon in London. Heads Together is a mental-health charity supported by the three British royals.
 ?? AP FILE PHOTO ?? In 1997, Diana, Princess of Wales, sits and talks to members of a Zenica volleyball team who have suffered injuries from landmines, during the second day of a visit to Bosnia Herzegovin­a, aimed at publicizin­g her campaign to ban land mines.
AP FILE PHOTO In 1997, Diana, Princess of Wales, sits and talks to members of a Zenica volleyball team who have suffered injuries from landmines, during the second day of a visit to Bosnia Herzegovin­a, aimed at publicizin­g her campaign to ban land mines.
 ?? AP FILE PHOTO ?? Diana, Princess of Wales, arrives for dinner in Washington, D.C., in 1996.
AP FILE PHOTO Diana, Princess of Wales, arrives for dinner in Washington, D.C., in 1996.
 ?? AP FILE PHOTO ?? Britain’s Prince Harry delivers a speech during Internatio­nal Mine Awareness Day at Kensington Palace in London, for two leading landmine charities, Mines Advisory Group (MAG) and The HALO Trust, aiming for a world free of landmines by 2025. Harry and...
AP FILE PHOTO Britain’s Prince Harry delivers a speech during Internatio­nal Mine Awareness Day at Kensington Palace in London, for two leading landmine charities, Mines Advisory Group (MAG) and The HALO Trust, aiming for a world free of landmines by 2025. Harry and...
 ?? AP FILE PHOTO ?? In 2012, Britain’s Prince William, the Duke of Cambridge, meets guests as he attends a reception prior to the annual October Club dinner as patron of the St. Giles Trust, in London. The legacy left by the late Princess Diana seems to live on through...
AP FILE PHOTO In 2012, Britain’s Prince William, the Duke of Cambridge, meets guests as he attends a reception prior to the annual October Club dinner as patron of the St. Giles Trust, in London. The legacy left by the late Princess Diana seems to live on through...

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