“It won’t last,” my schoolfriend Albert told me, as we staggered down London’s Embankment one summer evening in 2018, a few pints into his birthday pub crawl. I wasn’t sure as to what he was referring. The evening twilight? His youthful good looks? Our ability to walk in a straight line? He expanded: “Harry and Meghan. She’s not right for him. They’ll be divorced within five years. Just you wait.” Then he burped.
I was surprised by Albert’s comments. I, like tens of millions of other viewers, had been taken in by the royal wedding weeks before. Yes, the presence of Oprah Winfrey and an over-enthusiastic American preacher had been a little gauche. But as Harry ‘n’ Meghan tied the knot in glorious Windsor sunshine, a troubled prince seemed to have found permanent peace with a gorgeous wife.
Being teenagers, Albert and I had a particular affinity with young Harry. Blessed with the nation’s sympathy after his mother’s death, Harry seemed the endearing antithesis to his older brother’s prudishness. Naked romps in Las Vegas, Nazi armbands at parties, courting a stream of blondes… he was a Prince Hal for the 21st century, the nation’s endlessly entertaining Hooray Harry.
But, like the young Henry V, Harry’s coming of age was his most endearing. Shipped off to Afghanistan, the nice-but-dim younger son who had battled his way to passing grades at Eton was transformed into a model young soldier. But, once out of the army, rather than settle down with a Chelsy Davy or a Cressida Bonas, Harry found himself adrift. Unlike Henry V, Harry did not have the delights of conquering the French and a diplomatic marriage to keep him busy. Cue the arrival of Meghan Markle and the rest – as they say – is history.
Eight years on, however, and Albert’s pessimism has been confounded. Even in self-imposed exile in California, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex remain married. But their world has been transformed. The split from Buckingham Palace amid allegations of racism and bullying; a tell-all memoir; umpteen interviews, Netflix shows and brand relaunches… The pair might not have wanted to remain royals. But they have served the House of Windsor by providing the world’s longest-running soap opera with a bitter drama that only Harry’s late mother could have matched.
Last week’s quasi-royal tour of Australia seemed to show the pair on top form – a far more successful outing than England’s cricketers managed only a few months before. Harry was shown comforting survivors of the Bondi Beach shooting while Meghan pronounced to some young crowd that she had been the “most trolled person in the world” during a roundtable on social media and mental health.
Harry was a victim of peak woke
But behind the rictus grins deployed for their Aussie fans, the world of the Sussexes appears to be a bleak one. As laid out by Tom Bower in his latest palace pot-boiler Betrayal, the King’s youngest son and his Yankee bride find themselves strapped for cash, fighting for relevance and running out of allies and importance in both a homeland that has moved on from them and an adopted country that has grown sick of their antics. A Vanity Fair profile last year, entitled “American Hustle,” painted a grim picture of a pair fighting to pay their bills through an ever-growing number of failed business ventures, Netflix flops and popular apathy.
But while Meghan’s fate is unlikely to elicit much sympathy in a Britain that has long since written her off, Harry’s fate does. He seems lonely, cut off from his family and friends, still trotting out tired clichés about his mental health and estranged from the charities that once gave him purpose. When he was photographed last year ringing various London doorbells to try to find an old friend, it perfectly embodied a lost, young man unable to find his way home.
As journalist Kunley Drukpa has highlighted on X, Harry was a victim of peak woke. His wife embodies all its worst excesses: the stultifying focus on mental health, a nihilistic desire to tear down institutions, perpetual grievance-mongering around sex and race. As sexist as it may seem to blame Lady Megbeth, marrying her really was Harry’s greatest mistake. But it’s not too late.
As I read through Spare, Harry revealed himself to me. Not through the whinging about how Daddy didn’t hug him enough but through the anecdotes about his early years. Losing his virginity to an older woman behind a Cotswolds pub. Killing 25 Taliban fighters in Afghanistan. Getting frostbite on his todger during a visit to the Arctic. This is the Harry we once loved and that he could be again.
Returning to Britain would require the prince to eat a considerable slice of humble pie. He’d have to apologize to his father and brother for the pain he has put them through following his grandmother’s death, father’s illness and sister-in-law’s cancer treatment. But the prodigal son would be embraced by the nation.
The traditional House of Windsor error-correction route – a divorce – is available. Harry, leave the Duchess of Sussex an ocean away from a country she will never visit. Put the kids in a decent private school, find yourself an English Rose and come home.
Saving Harry would not only give the Windsors some rare good news but would be a sign that even the most disastrous mistakes can be rectified. If The Spectator can save Gentleman’s Relish, we can rescue the Duke of Sussex. If Harry can be fixed, so can Britain. The first round is on me, your restored royal highness.
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