The last global monarch

This article is published in issue 16 of Vanity Fair on newsstands until April 19, 2022

Although equipped only with one hundred and sixty-two centimeters in stature and therefore denied an Amazonian gait, even though it seems fragile and as if painted in watercolor, this tiny figurine sitting on the oldest and most prestigious throne in the worldafter that of the Pope, she has the power to have Boris Johnson arrested, to dissolve Parliament, to appoint Anglican bishops, to declare war and to make peace, and even to ask, if the ball turns wrong, the hanging of someone who kills one of the swans or ducks swimming in the ponds of St. James’s park and carrying the crown and the initials of Queen Elizabeth impressed under the wing.
“Her Majesty is a beautiful girl / But she doesn’t have much to say”, sang Beatle Paul McCartney in a playful ditty from the 1969 album Abbey Road. Words that come to mind every time Queen Elizabeth hits the news, which has happened a lot in recent years, with the Netflix series. The Crownthe death of her husband, Prince Philip, last April, and her front-page misadventures of the royal line.

At the end of October, however, the news that the queen was hospitalized “for some preliminary investigations” had raised a different level of emotion and anxietynot entirely relieved by the reassuring addendum that she “remains in a good mood.”

Also to 95 years old70 years on the throne, fresh from widowhood, Queen Elizabeth maintains a monstrous mastery of her craft as queen. Although lacking in humor, obsessed instead with the awareness of her position, imbued with the exalted sense of duty in pure English style, in an age in which old age and hereditary privilege are largely out of fashion, Elizabeth has always been kept in huge media coverage, as evidenced by its popularity ratings constantly high over the centuries. After all, no other head of state has managed to merge the ancient rites of the hereditary monarchy with the democratic government like her.

There are a dozen monarchies in Europe and around 27 countries with royal families around the world, but beyond their kingdoms, few people are even aware that Norway has a king (Harald V) or Thailand can name the ruler ( the current one is called Maha Vajiralongkorn Bodindradebayavarangkun), much less take seriously the “Romanov royal wedding” staged in St. Petersburg. But when Queen Elizabeth takes her secular presence away from her, it’s doubtful whether Prince Charles or Prince William, the two candidates for the British throne, will ever fill her royal slippers. He could be the last global monarch in the world. Although she has always had “a lot to say,” given what she has seen, heard and endured, she has largely kept it to herself. For all the countless speeches he made and the amount of banquet and meeting jokes he exchanged with an endless parade of rulers, politicians, celebrities and subjects, including five Popes and 13 of the last 14 presidents of the United States (the missing president is Lyndon B. Johnson), he has never given an interview to a reporter. Among the very few revealing statements she let slip, the famous reference to 1992, the year in which three royal marriages fell apart and the fire destroyed a hundred rooms in Windsor Castle, like his “annus horribilis”. And it was in Latin.
Usually, her messages – unlike the Queen’s speech she reads at the annual Parliament opening – have been encouraging invocations of duty, courage and other chivalrous virtues. In one of his first important speeches, given in Cape Town, South Africa, on his 21st birthday, April 21, 1947, as heir to the crown, he invoked the “noble motto” embraced by previous heirs when they reached the eldest. age: “I am at your service”. “I’d like to make that dedication now,” she continued. “It’s very simple. I declare before you all that my whole life, long or short, will be dedicated to your service and to the service of our great imperial family to which we all belong. ” In retrospect, the story of that “I am in your service” may no longer seem so noble. Seven decades ago, South Africa was ruled exclusively by whites and many countries around the world had not yet gained independence from the British Empire. The inherent racism of Britain’s colonial past has recently been the subject of new controversy through allegations by Meghan Markle and Prince Harry. Yet with her face enameled according to ancient and classic makeup systems, Queen Elizabeth has remained true to the “very simple” vow she made when she was a 21-year-old princess.

Decade after decade, as his images on the banknotes of the many Commonwealth kingdoms in which he is still the head of state have changed to reflect a maturing monarch, he has continued to faithfully and flawlessly perform his many royal duties, which often included long journeys, long bows, long ceremonies. Over the centuries, she has become the longest-running and reigning monarch, surpassed only by Louis XIV of France, who however ascended the throne at the tender age of 4. This is the only point of comparison between Elizabeth II and the flaming Sun King, who took pains to glorify her absolute dominion in sumptuous paintings and palaces. Confidentiality, simplicity and obedience to constitutional constraints they were intrinsic to the reign of Queen Elizabeth, creating a picture that writers, artists, filmmakers, tabloids, haberdasheries and audiences filled with any color, emotion and souvenir from cups and plates and boxes of cookies.