Dripping with acid, boyfriend’s words of betrayal
ON DRUGS AND NUDE SWIMMING
For three surreal years, Ella and I hung about Kensington Palace; we swam naked in the Queen’s pool in Buckingham Palace; we did MDMA [ecstasy] in Windsor Castle… The cosy crowned heads of small Eastern European countries cooked us lamb chops late at night and told us tales of Nazis and Communists. It was a wonderful way to spend one’s 20s.
ON LIFE AT KENSINGTON PALACE
I have happy memories of KP – Burmese cats in window seats and wooden commodes, deep bathtubs and walled gardens – but the truth is that until Will and Kate arrived to liven up the place, Kensington Palace was wildly depressing.
ON RACISM AND THE ROYALS
She [Princess Michael] feigned an odd mixture of injustice and contrition: ‘I daren’t even say I want my coffee black any more…’ I would have liked to believe her but I had my doubts. It was not that her father had allegedly been an SS officer, albeit a reluctant one; Royals and Nazis go together like blini and caviar.
ON PRINCESS MICHAEL’S VIEW OF MARRIAGE
She was of the firm belief that it was a bad idea for royalty to marry commoners. ‘It’s all very well Ella marrying Mr Taseer from India or Pakistan,’ she once said to me… ‘But the moment the girl down the road thinks she can be a Princess, or Queen, it’s all over. The mystery is gone.’
ON ROYAL PARSIMONY
My own enduring memory of the Windsors was of constant cutbacks and reduced circumstances. To fly with royalty was to fly EasyJet.