Royal commentators say Duchess has fallen out of love with UK
‘Meghan Markle’s just not that into Britain’: Royal commentators say Duchess has fallen out of love with UK… but warn celebrity Sussexes will end up ‘bigger than the Queen’
Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s shocking step down from their royal duties, now known as ‘Megxit’, has sparked furious debate among royal commentators in the British press.
The Duke and Duchess spent an extended Christmas break in Canada with their baby son Archie, before returning to break the news – and now, the Queen and other senior royals have ordered their teams to find a ‘workable solution’ to the young royal couple’s future roles.
Here, Jeremy Clarkson wonders whether either of them thought Megxit through, while Judith Woods laments that it’s time to ‘face the fact’ that ‘Meghan has broken up with Britain’ in the Telegraph.
Carole Malone accuses the couple of being ‘selfish and disrespectful’ in the Daily Express while Giles Coren says, ‘Who wouldn’t want to withdraw from public life now?’ in the Times…
The announcement that Prince Harry and Meghan Markle plan to spend more time together in North America and quit their frontline royal duties has sent shockwaves around the world
JUDITH WOODS, The Daily Telegraph: ‘Blame is pointless. Meghan was just not that into Britain’
‘We’ve pleaded. We’ve scolded. We’ve cajoled. But the time has come to face the facts. Meghan has broken up with Britain. Short of stealing her vertiginous Manolo Blahniks and locking her up in the Tower, there’s nothing more we can do to make the Duchess of Sussex stay.
‘Free-spirited Meghan was probably expecting Downton Abbey, bless her. What she got was grief; for being unnecessarily slim, for not being Kate, for wearing the wrong nail polish, for being American, for being too sincere, for not being sincere.
‘It’s pointless to apportion blame; she’s just not that into us, much as both sides tried to make it work. We may feel bewildered and saddened but surely the only honourable response is to wish her well?
‘It is far, far better that Meghan falls out of love with Britain than out of love with Harry,’ writes Judith Woods in the Daily Telegraph.
Giles Coren: ‘Sorry Mum, I’m stepping down as a senior Coren’
GILES COREN, The Times: ‘Sorry Mum, I’m stepping down as a senior Coren’
‘After many months of reflection and internal discussions – shut up dear, I’m typing – we have chosen to make a transition this year in starting to carve out a progressive new role for ourselves.
‘Indeed, who wouldn’t want to withdraw from public life now, given the chance? Would wouldn’t want to drop out of pretty much everything? And who could possible argue that Harry and Meghan have not caught the mood of the 2020s way ahead of everyone else?
‘Haven’t we all had enough of the last few years? Not just of our boring jobs and empty lives, the pressures of status and money and debt and health and family and all the things that have always made the Reginald Perrin option (clothes on the beach, fake drowning, new life elsewhere) seem so appealing, but of the increasingly public that so many of us lead now, thanks to social media, camera surveillance, reality television….
‘That’s what 2020 is going to be, I’m sure of it, the year when everyone just says f*** it, enough is enough, and drops the hell out.
‘But please, do tell your grandma first,’ Giles Coren writes in the Times.
Janice Turner: ‘Harry and Meghan will outgrow the Queen’
JANICE TURNER, The Times: ‘Harry and Meghan will outgrow the Queen’
‘All those pinky-ringed courtiers and princely biographers saying Harry will regret it, he’ll struggle outside the family, that you can’t be a half-way royal, haven’t a clue. They’re drunk on deference or just plain old.
‘Because, like it or not, Harry and Meghan will be bigger than the Queen. Anyone who doubts that misunderstands how modern celebrity and royalty are so well-suited.
‘Many have scoffed that Meghan ”just wants to be Diana”. But she already is.
‘The British Public tolerates minor royals only because they amuse us, and what is more entertaining: a plaque unveiling on a wet Wednesday in Wolves or Megxit?’ writes Janice Turner in the Times.
Fiona Phillips: ‘Harry has every right to be angry’
FIONA PHILLIPS, The Mirror: ‘Harry has every right to be angry and protective of his own little family’
‘Prince Harry was robbed of his mother by a whipped-up, pernicious national obsession with Diana’s real-life princess charm and beauty. He, of all Diana’s mourners, was the most angry.
‘He has every right to be angry and protective of his own little family. And if he feels working outside the Royal Family is a means to that end, so be it.
‘And we should have the courtesy to leave them be,’ Fiona Phillips writes in the Mirror.
Jeremy Clarkson: ‘Do they know the next in line is… Prince Andrew?’
JEREMY CLARKSON, The Sun: ‘Resign from the Royal Family? Do they know the next in line is…Prince Andrew?’
‘Resigning from the Royal Family? That’s like, you know, BIG. And not just because the next in line to the throne if Harry’s family has gone is… Prince Andrew.
‘Every fibre of his being will have been quivering with nerves, but you get the impression that he’s not actually capable of saying “no” to Meghan.
‘Some imply she bullies him, and I don’t think that’s fair. He is, however, definitely obsessed with her.
‘Obviously, Meghan can go back to acting. But what about Harry? What’s he going to do? Work behind the meat counter at Costco? I’ve met him a couple of times and he’s very down to earth. So he probably thinks he could do jobs like that but, take it from me mate, you’d last a week.
‘In a month you’d be like your father-in-law, a fat, jobless weirdo turning tricks for paps. And a month after that, your glamorous, gorgeous wife would be on the back of a playboy’s boat, conjuring up the sympathy vote.
‘The tale of Harry and Meghan is an epic love story and I wish them both well, but I genuinely fear that it will not have a happy ending,’ Jeremy Clarkson writes in the Sun.
Christopher Wilson: ‘What will happen if the wheels fall off Prince Harry and Meghan’s love wagon?’
CHRISTOPHER WILSON, Royal Biographer in The Sun: ‘What will happen if the wheels fall off Prince Harry and Meghan’s love wagon?’
‘We wish them the best of luck — and if a happier life is what they’re searching for, then why not?
‘But what happens if the wheels fall off the Harry and Meghan love wagon? What happens to Harry if things go wrong? Does he have a Plan B?
‘The Duke and Duchess have a rosy vision of the future. It will be a life away from prying eyes where they make their own money and live life as they want, freed from duty.
‘But, critics say, Meghan may soon tire of her husband along with the corner she’s painted herself into by giving up her film star life to become a royal.
‘Then there’s the question of baby Archie. Will he in the future be allowed to claim kinship with the Royal Family, living back in the country where he was born?
‘Or will he become just another celebrity kid in a Tinseltown mansion without a sense of purpose or direction?’, Christopher Wilson writes in the Sun.
Carole Malone: ‘I hate to say I told you so’
CAROLE MALONE, The Daily Express: ‘I hate to say I told you so’
‘It’s the greed and the deceit that make this all so low-rent and ugly. How can two people who’ve been given so much still be as selfish and disrespectful as Meghan and Harry? Because while this joke woke couple have tried to kid us they’re all about charity and saving the planet, what they’re actually about is money.
‘Most sickening of all was the totally groundless narrative that the British tabloid press was racist and that both she and Harry were being hounded – just like Diana was. I’m glad they’re going.
‘Harry’s no longer the man we all loved and Meghan’s been sticking two fingers up at the monarchy and everything it stands for from the off. And while I’d love Her Maj to strip them of their titles, withdraw security, take back Frogmore Cottage and stop all their allowances, I know she won’t.
‘Not after Diana,’ writes Carole Malone in the Daily Express.
Mark Steel: ‘No wonder Meghan and Harry are stepping back – she’s probably running for Labour leader’
MARK STEEL, The Independent: ‘No wonder Meghan and Harry are stepping back – she’s probably running for Labour leader’
‘What this story needs to make it perfect, is for Meghan Markle to announce she’s standing as candidate to lead the Labour Party, and that she already has the backing of the General Municipal Boilermakers Union.
‘Because there seems to be such confusion, especially from Buckingham Palace, as to why she and Harry are withdrawing from the royal family.
‘And it is a puzzle, why anyone would want to break their association with an uncle who was best friends with a convicted paedophile, and a father who employs someone to run his bath, and a granddad who probably said to Meghan at Christmas dinner, “I expect your sort aren’t used to turkey as you’d rather boil a missionary.”
‘What they haven’t explained is how they’re going to manage this. Maybe it’s not an accident this has happened in January, during the transfer window. Perhaps they’re having a medical and if all goes well they’ll be transferred to the Moroccan royal family, ready to start by the weekend,’ Mark Steel writes in the Independent.
Amna Saleem: ‘Harry and Meghan were meant to embody post-racial Britain. So much for that’
AMNA SALEEM, The Guardian: ‘Harry and Meghan were meant to embody post-racial Britain. So much for that’
‘It’s the stuff romcoms are made of: beautiful young woman meets charming prince and, after a series of mild miscommunications, they live happily ever after. Well, that’s how it’s supposed to go at least.
‘Meghan Markle, the much put upon protagonist of this Nora Ephron-meets-Get Out fairytale, has gone off-script and attempted to create a different happy ending, and with good reason.
‘Everything that could have predicted the pair’s joint decision to step back as senior royals can be directly traced back through all the sensationalist and derogatory headlines written about Markle. She couldn’t even enjoy avocados without being framed as a drought- and murder-fuelling traitor, set on bringing down the monarchy.
‘It seems that much of Britain desperately wants to be absolved its racist history without doing any work to combat racism – treating marginalisation and discrimination like imagined annoyances not worth confronting.
‘But looking at the fate of a royal couple that was supposed to symbolise progression and a supposedly “post-racial” British society, it seems clear that there is still much work to be done,’ writes Amna Saleem in the Guardian.
Anne McElvoy: ‘The Meghan I met was impressive and determined – but this path will be hard’
ANNE MCELVOY, The Evening Standard: ‘The Meghan I met was impressive and determined — but this path will be hard’
‘It was billed as the grand reboot of the 21st-century monarchy — a match that would add transatlantic pizzazz to the staid tribe of Windsor.
‘Less than two years on, there has turned out to be short-stay parking at the palace, and yesterday marked an abrupt rush for the exit.
‘Someone has to pick up the pieces when the royal china is smashed. So, let’s wish Meghan and Harry contentment.
‘But departing with good grace and due regard for what they leave behind will bring them a far more prudent legacy than succumbing to the temptation of a slammed door,’ Anne McElvoy writes in the Evening Standard.
Source: Read Full Article