A crowning glory in Covid-19 crisis
A RARE and unseasonal visit by the Queen to the living rooms of British people and a global Commonwealth family has been heralded a huge success and a ray of hope under the dark clouds of the coronavirus pandemic.
Recorded inside Windsor Castle and at around four minutes long, the Sunday broadcast offered a spoonful of sugar to help the medicine of quarantine go down, while recognising the “disruption” and pain of the emergency.
It was a rallying cry for her people; a ‘keep calm and carry on’ message underlining everyone had a part to play - the frontline health and care workers; those in essential jobs; and those whose duty remains in simply staying at home.
And after the eagerly anticipated historic address to her people, there was a spike in social media messages praising the speech from Her Majesty “defender of the faith”. One message simply read “God save the Queen”; others thanked her for making sense of “uncertainty”; and generally appreciating the reminder “we are all in this together and we will win against the coronavirus”.
Even republicans bowed to acknowledge it was a masterpiece in quietly putting the emergency in its correct setting, seemingly achieving more in a short time than the constant barrage from political leaders - for many a reminder why we live in a constitutional monarchy and why we have a Sovereign at the top of the pile.
The Queen gently reminded her listeners of the “challenging times”; thanked health and essential workers for their efforts, adding: “Every hour of your hard work brings us closer to a return to more normal times.”
Her words also allowed people to feel special, a Blitz spirit for a new millennium. “And those who come after us will say that the Britons of this generation were as strong as any. That the attributes of selfdiscipline, of quiet, good-humoured resolve and of fellow feeling still characterise this country.”
And in another nod to a world at war, her speech echoed the sentiments of wartime forces sweetheart Dame Vera Lynn and the popular song ‘We’ll Meet Again”. The Queen said: “We will succeed and that success will belong to every one of us.
COMFORT
“We should take comfort that while we may have more to endure, better days will return; we will be with our friends again; we’ll meet again.”
The Queen’s Speech at Christmas remains a central part of December 25 but perhaps - with the media able to set the tone and the headlines ahead of the broadcast - it has lost some of its impact and is no longer seen as essential viewing; news programmes and the newspapers will after all report the highlights.
This was only the fifth time the Queen has addressed her subjects in an ad hoc speech in her 69-year reign - she did so before after her mother’s death in 2002; a belated broadcast following the death of Diana, Princess of Wales; in recognition of her own Diamond Jubilee; and before the first Gulf War.
In 1940, together with her late sister Princess Margaret, the then 14-year-old Princess Elizabeth did make a wartime broadcast to children being evacuated; calling on them to have courage as the royal sisters knew what it was like to be separated from loved ones it is a point she made again on Sunday, the pain of being kept apart from family and friends.
Alastair Campbell, one time advisor to Labour leader Tony Blair, and a “fairly persistent” republican has since penned the 93-year-old monarch an emotional tribute; setting out a 10-point argument for describing her as “one of, if not the, most remarkable people on the planet.”
He said Queen Elizabeth had changed with the times riding out hard time at a national and personal level and shown an endearing capability of “rebooting” the Royal Family while staying almost 70 years “in the job”.
American writer and essayist Ralph Waldo Emmerson, says Campbell, set out how the Earth endures and the stars abide - writing: “The Earth and the stars don’t have a strategy. They just are. The Queen just is.”