Womb watch
Vile fascination with Kate’s body
THE BOOKMAKERS Coral and Ladbrokes have suspended betting on the question of whether the Duchess of Cambridge will announce a pregnancy this month.
This followed a series of online bets, which may more accurately be described as leaks-for-cash; we don’t yet know. This may be nothing in a dystopia in which Prince George appears on the cover of the current edition of Vanity Fair described as ‘‘ the world’s most eligible infant’’, which is gruesome – who cares to speculate on the future romantic adventures of a baby? Even so, I cannot begin to imagine what sort of person puts a bet on the mysteries of a stranger’s uterus, although I can imagine all sorts of tasteless variables relating to the royal condition I could bet on. But I will not write them down. They are too unkind.
I hesitate to write about the internal miseries of the monarchy because who cares? But when blind men beg for pennies in the City of London, and I read about the specifications of the Cambridge kitchens, which are multiple and huge, divided between their newly- restored palace in Kensington and their newlyrestored country house in Norfolk, it is hard to summon sympathy for a duchess. She is modern in the sense – and only in the sense – that she chose her destiny; should she not be left to it?
The enhanced income of the royal family has surprisingly few critics. The unwillingness to show even silent solidarity with the victims of austerity by spending less is just as surprising – if you swallow the fantasy that they care for us. (The opposite, in fact, is true.
They recently bought a helicopter; and Catherine’s wardrobe allowance will never be made public, for reasons, I suspect, relating to national security). In which case, do we mind if a personal appearance on a betting slip is considered part of the payoff? The royal family has always been a source of entertainment to those who subsidise it, although that is not the darkest part of the bargain (that accolade goes to the inequality in the very bones of Britain; it teaches us to look fondly – and nostalgically – on tyranny). It is a cruel arrangement, and often tasteless. Not that I think they mind. They’d rather scrutinise their bodies than their bank accounts.
Even so, I resent the objectification of any woman, even of a woman who compulsively objectifies herself. The the gifting of Catherine’s body to the public sphere is revolting and comprehensive; first her sister Pippa’s buttocks, roped in for a global obsession of the most moronic kind; then her own breasts; now the womb. It is not forgiven by noting that royalty has always endured this because the golden dynasty must be secured. A news culture that transformed the birth of Prince George into a carnival compounds the offence.
Can I hear a silent protest in the shrinking of Catherine’s body, in her morbid commitment to personal grooming? Is that how she tells her stories? In flesh – and absence of flesh? She has no other way to do it. Monarchy is sense to the analytical. Its must be told in pictures.
There is a wider danger. If an exalted woman can suffer this, what defence is there for the rest? Catherine may have chosen to act as an outreach programme for reactionary gender politics, but those who have not are equally debased. The fascination with her body does not bespeak adoration of any kind, but control. And, where women are concerned, that control is never sated. nonstory