King Charles III (Aaron Chown/PA)
(Picture: PA Wire)Monarchy makes no rational sense these days. The monarch is a small god to commune around but we are a democracy now, and they must please us, not we them. The British monarchy reinvents itself constantly: that is why it survives while every other major European monarchy — the Russian, the German, the Austro-Hungarian — has fallen. For as long as people like it, it will stay. This presents a puzzle for each monarch, and each heir: how will they survive?
Elizabeth II thrived by staying dutiful, constant and largely silent: when she did speak, she was graceful. Not for her the rudeness of Lady Susan Hussey: Elizabeth II strived to be an ideal, and largely succeeded. She had luck too: her myth was made in wartime, and the victory rubbed off. She was both grand and humble: that was her contortion, and it worked.
