Prince Harry wants a reconciliation with his family and he’s reached out to Kate and the King after their health scares. But, Emily Andrews asks, after all he’s said and done, is it too late?
I t’s actually quite staggering to look back at some of the things Harry said and wrote just a year ago as he was promoting his autobiography Spare.
The bitterness and rancour didn’t just drip from the ghost-written pages, he also gave interview after interview in which he appeared to accuse his family of racism, self-promotion, sacrificing him for their own personal gain and, last but not least, generally being an institution that was unfit for purpose.
In effect, a royal was saying that the monarchy doesn’t work and the whole shooting match needs complete reform.
In terms of reputational damage, I’m not sure that Harry could have said anything more damaging.
Now, I understand that Harry wants a reconciliation.
Time to come together
The news that the Princess of Wales had been hospitalised for major abdominal surgery, necessitating up to three months of recovery, and his father had undergone a ‘corrective procedure’ for an enlarged prostate reportedly led Harry to reach out to his family.
One would hope that serious health matters could or would enable family ruptures to be repaired.
As Harry himself said to The Telegraph last year regarding Spare, ‘You could argue that some of the stuff I’ve put in there, well they [his family] will never forgive me anyway.’ And he went on, in a direct appeal to those he feels have wronged him and Meghan (namely Charles, Camilla, William and Kate), ‘But the way that I see it is, I’m willing to forgive you for everything you’ve done, and I wish you’d actually sit down with me, properly, and instead of saying I’m delusional and paranoid, actually sit down and have a proper conversation about this, because what I’d really like is some accountability. And an apology to my wife… Because you know what you did, and I now know why you did it. And you’ve been caught out, so just come clean, and then we could all move on.’
Of course, in another world the news that three of the top-tier royals were out of action (William has postponed his engagements to look after his wife and children) would have been the moment for Prince Harry to do what he did best: getting stuck into work – charming the public, raising spirits. Perhaps he’d be sending cheery messages to his brother and sister-in-law on the family Whats
