United Kingdom: A nation says farewell to Prince Philip
The “extraordinary marriage” at the heart of Britain’s royal family has come to its sad end, said Tim Adams in The Observer. Prince Philip, Queen Elizabeth II’s husband of 73 years, died last week in his sleep at age 99 (see Obituaries, p. 39). The couple were famously close for all those decades, not least because there was “undeniable passion” at the outset. The princess was smitten at age 13, when she first set eyes on the then-18-year-old Royal Navy cadet; the two exchanged letters during his military service in World War II and married in 1947. Always standing by her side, always dutifully walking the required two steps behind his monarch, the Duke of Edinburgh embodied the “dying arts of duty and stickability.” Born into the Danish and Greek royal families, he nevertheless toted his own bags, fried his own eggs, and mixed his own gin and tonics. He studiously avoided media attention, realizing “that a royal family that seemed to enjoy the trappings of fame and privilege could never survive in the modern world.”
Philip’s legacy is complicated by his litany of “gaffes,” said Luke Harding in The Guardian. Some of his off-the-cuff comments could be dismissed as misguided attempts at humor. Speaking to a driving instructor in Scotland, the prince remarked, “How do you keep the natives off the booze long enough to pass the test?” Other comments provoked accusations of racism. He once asked an indigenous Australian businessman, “Do you still throw spears at each other?” So it’s understandable that many Britons were irritated by the nonstop media coverage of his death, said
Kevin McKenna in The Herald. For a whole day, the BBC’s main TV channels were filled with tributes to the duke from simpering anchors and “an assortment of establishment lickspittles”; the state-funded broadcaster’s radio stations played only instrumentals and somber songs. More than 110,000 people filed complaints about this wall-towall coverage—the most in the BBC’s history—with many questioning the relentless focus on the passing of one elderly man when more than 150,000 Britons have died of Covid-19.
At least Philip’s funeral will be the modest affair he wanted, said Robert Hardman in the Daily Mail. Partly because of pandemic restrictions, only 30 people will attend the April 17 ceremony at St George’s Chapel on the grounds of Windsor Castle. The mourners will include his grandson Prince Harry but not Harry’s wife, Meghan, who will stay home in the U.S. because she is pregnant and has a history of miscarriage. In line with Philip’s wishes, his coffin will be carried not in an elaborate horsedrawn carriage, but in “a Land Rover specially converted for funereal use” that the duke designed. How appropriate that this passionate tinkerer devised something “technical, original, and quintessentially British” for his “last hurrah.” Philip’s role in the royal family was “singular and irreplaceable,” said the Daily Mirror in an editorial. Now it is Prince Charles who must be the queen’s rock and help her lead the family. Can Charles fill his father’s shoes? That will be the final test “of his long apprenticeship for the role of king.”