Tina Brown says Prince Harry is ‘really obsessed’ because he wants to protect Queen Elizabeth

Vivid Biography of The Princess of Wales by Tina Brown, Diana Chronicles, is, many of its fans will say, one of the great royal books. Now that Brown, founding editor of The Daily Beast (full disclosure: she hired this reporter) is back with a new royal collection, Palace Paperswill likely become a must-read for gossip site junkies as well as royal historians.

It covers the special part of the last 25 years of royal history since the death of Princess Diana, but certainly perhaps, the most intriguing part of the book is dominated by the Sussex drama.

Among the bombshells in Brown’s book is revealed that his then-girlfriend Cressida Bonas first encouraged Harry to go to therapy after he “vented his anger” at her, and that he had MI6 hooks up with world-class therapists who used to help spies recalibrate after a dangerous mission results.

However, Cressida is tired not only of life under the spotlight but also of Harry’s incessant complaints about the press and “date nights”, which only include watching Netflix. at his messy house and ended the relationship.

Brown also said that William and Harry’s squabbles over their areas of philanthropic influence had become “Olympic seats” because Harry felt his brother was “looking for the best shorts”, especially especially for environmental and conservation reasons.

The Sussexes, on the day I spoke (on the phone) with Brown, were back a lot in the news thanks to Harry telling Hoda Kotb that part of the purpose of the queen’s visit was to make sure his grandmother was taken care of. “Proper protection. . ”

“When that popped up on my phone, I was amazed. I sat there and thought, “This is so arrogant for the rest of the family,” Brown said, adding, “Where was Harry with the queen, during the pandemic? Where had he been for the queen during the days of Philip’s profound decline? Where was he for the queen at Philip’s memorial service?

“All he did was make her extremely worried and in pain. And then he turned around and said, ‘I’m here to see that she’s protected.’ That was a really stupid comment and I’m sure it brought the rest of the family to the brink… .Charles, Anne, Edward and William must be going crazy. I just thought he would say things like that.”

Last week, Harry also claimed that his mother’s intervention ghost had “done it” with William and is now “helping him a lot”.

“I think he’s out of touch with reality,” Brown said. “I think he has developed an overblown ego and sense of self [as evidenced by] his smirking comment about, ‘I have such a special relationship with the queen.’ Honestly, it’s all just really out of order and wrong.

“The Queen is very, very fond of him but for him to celebrate his relationship with the queen, at a time when he should be quite pleased with her reception of him, it seems really detrimental to me.”

Harry’s comments about his favored status with the queen – he actually said: “We have a really special relationship, we talk about things she can’t tell anyone who else” —there is a passage in Brown’s book about Harry and Meghan being “drunk in fantasy” that they could reshape the world in the early days of their marriage.

“They fooled each other with the illusion that they were put on earth to save the world,” Brown said. “It’s a laudable goal, but extremely unspecified. Harry has an absolute winner with Invictus [the event for wounded servicemen he founded]. It was the best thing he ever did. It worked brilliantly and noble and wonderful, but otherwise they would have sat in Montecito for two years making the announcement. I just don’t think it’s in their interest to lecture anyone.”

Chris Jackson – Pool / Getty Images

Brown writes compellingly about the relationship between Harry and William, and how much hole Harry’s departure has left in his brother’s life.

“It’s a huge loss for William,” Brown said. “He’s very, very upset about it, but he’s not going to talk about it, because he’s triggered by it. Little did he know that this could happen, that this would not be just a spat or break but a deep and bitter estrangement that seemed to have no way out right now. ”

The current circumstances make the possibility of Harry and Meghan going back to the Platinum Year in vain.

Brown said: “I don’t think Meghan wants to go back to the UK. “I think she hates England. I think she feels England has rejected her and she has rejected England and it is not in her interest to go back to England. I know Harry talked about maybe having some mediator work with William, but honestly, I think the brothers need to go down to the pub together, hug and have a screaming match and air release. “

Then there are Harry’s odd comments claiming ownership of Diana’s ghost – “Looks like she’s done her job with my brother and now she’s been of great help to me. ,” Harry told Kotb.

“It was a minor comment,” Brown said. “Harry has always been thought of as a somewhat reckless and feisty character, but he has proven more as the years go by than less. The Spencers are a hot-tempered family. My feeling is that Harry has always been Spencer and William has become Windsor; he is careful, he is cautious, he considers, he is calm, he is a calm character and thinks a lot before he agrees to everything. He always knew his fate and he accepted it. But Harry, you know, he never got the memo that he was a second son. “

The relationship with William was just as bad, Harry and Charles’s relationship seems to be even worse considering Brown’s book.

“It was a great tragedy for Charles,” Brown said. “He was extremely fond of Harry, very protective of Harry. He loves Harry. In fact, many people feel his relationship with Harry is much closer than his relationship with William, and I think Charles is really confused about how things can turn out like this. . “

One thing could be easily explained – if writer Christopher Andersen’s claim that it was Charles who was called a royal racist is true. Does Brown believe them?

“I don’t know – that I don’t know. But we will never know that. I do not know. Something had apparently happened, something that seemed to have happened that made it unchangeable. Harry has said in a previous interview “Our father was there for us.” Now, he’s not even prepared to say that he misses his brother and father. It must have hurt both of them.”

Harry’s comments suggesting the queen have unreliable advisers remind me of another passage in Brown’s book where she talks about Harry’s disparagement of the queen’s private secretary, Edward Young.

Max Mumby / Indigo / Getty Images

On brief notice, Young canceled a private meeting between Harry and the queen in the early days of exit negotiations, because, Brown said, Young feared that Harry was trying to shorten institutional procedures by approach the queen on a personal level on a constitutional issue. “People want to go around the machine and ask questions for themselves, because they are more likely to get a yes answer,” as she says.

Was the Kotb interview another attack on Young?

“Sure,” said Brown, “And I had no doubt of that during my brief fifteen-minute meeting with Charles [which preceded Harry and Meghan’s meeting with the queen] That meeting was about Charles saying to Harry, ‘Look, when you see the queen, you’re treating the queen like her grandma, she’s happy to see you as her grandma, she doesn’t have one. nothing but warm feelings for you like your grandmother, but don’t try to start lobbying her on institutional issues. ‘

“I’m sure that’s what was passed on to Harry because he seemed to have completely forgotten about the rehearsal. As I write in the book, there is a difference they all understand as to whether you will see the queen as a mummy or a grandmother, or if you will see the queen as a Queen, Queen Elizabeth II. And if it’s the latter, then she’ll have her executive team with her, her private secretaries and her assistants, etc., who will be there with the notes and programs work as they should. She’s the chief executive of the monarchy and if you try to surround her, she needs those around her to make sure she’s protected—protected from Harry. ”

Harry and Meghan have found leaving the royal family more complicated than anticipated.

“From my own reporting, I know they had a much harder time becoming a freelance brand,” says Brown. “Although the palace is quite frustrating, rather shabby and quite old-fashioned, there is nothing more convincing than a phone call that begins, ‘This is Buckingham Palace.’ Those calls can help you with anything. They don’t have that support anymore. They only have to rely on the PR people they hire in California. And the PR people they hire in California really don’t understand mysticism or royal charisma. And what they’ve done has greatly reduced the mystique and charisma of the royal family – and the fact that they live in Montecito with a PR machine that isn’t the Palace is diminishing every day. “

Samir Hussein / WireImage

Then there’s Prince Andrew. and why the queen allowed herself to have him enter the church during Prince Philip’s memorial service shortly after he solved a sex case, allegedly with her millions of dollars.

“She’s vulnerable to the influence of her children,” says Brown. “This is why she needs her own secretary when making decisions like that, because she is also a mother. It also speaks to her own hurt feelings that day. It was a very emotional occasion for her. Maybe she was grateful for her son’s arm as she walked down the aisle.”

Brown doesn’t think we’ll see Andrew again at the Jubilee celebrations this summer.

Brown said: “But Andrew was the closest to her of them all, and he had nothing to do with it. “In any family, there is a child closest to an aging parent, who lives closer, can run over there and be called, and will certainly be closer to an aging parent. How much more will he lobby for the queen? Will we wake up one day to find that the queen wanted him to be Sandringham? I think there’s a lot of anxiety right now about Andrew’s proximity to the queen. She is vulnerable. And it’s not a good form for Andrew to try to take advantage of his position to get her to do things that he knows are not in her favor.”