The Duchess, The Prince, and the Practice of Holding Other People's Stories
We're talking about Meghan and Harry but we're not really talking about Meghan and Harry
For the past six years in June, I’ve become deeply nostalgic about a life I’ve never lived and that is the version of me who was born and raised in England. To be clear, I’ve lived in North Carolina for over twenty five years and was born and raised in Columbus, Indiana (and quite proud of it!). But when I went to London for the first time in 2018, I did the thing I nearly always do when I travel and considered that THIS is, in fact, where I should ACTUALLY live and breathe and have my being. What if I had? Who would I be?
That first trip took place just a few months after the royal wedding of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, known then as Prince Harry and Meghan Markle.
The following summer, in 2019, I was back in the UK, this time staying at a place in Windsor just one block away from The Long Walk where you could see the roof of what I can’t be sure but I’m telling myself is Frogmore Cottage where the Duke and Duchess still lived at the time.
ANYWAY, while we were there Baby Archie was christened and we stood outside Windsor Castle alongside the other people who were not invited and we watched the goings on, including this live broadcast with a royal correspondent.
We had a big time that summer and maybe that’s what caught my interest initially. But then when the Sussexes decided (were forced to?) step down as senior working royals in 2020, I was locked in. Knowing when to stay and when to leave is my whole jam, and I’m always fascinated by (and have a lot of compassion for) this process. I cannot imagine what it was like for them personally to navigate this on such a public scale.
Of course we learned more from the couple themselves in the Oprah interview, the Netflix special, and the memoir, Spare, which I listened to in two days time.
A person’s story is a whole world, revealing something deeply true (if not always The Truth). And to read it, especially to hear the person read it in their own voice, is both honor and wonder. My opinion of his story, his life, or even the way in which he tells it is deeply irrelevant.
Having said that, when someone writes a book, it's an invitation to a conversation with a reader and the writer doesn’t get to control the conversation the reader wants to have.
Briefly I’ll say I mostly enjoyed listening to his story, even as it was, at times heartbreaking (the loss of his mother, the abandonment he felt as a young boy, the unresolved grief he carried for so many years) and somewhat redundant (the constant criticism of the media, the long descriptions of his military service.) Of course the tabloid media (the villain) was central to his life story, as was his military service, as it's what saved him, in many ways. But there were moments during those sections where I found myself wanting to move things along.
To me, the book reads as an authentic expression of someone who felt he had little control over his own life, who is understandably angry at the systems that have perpetuated that lack of control, and who desperately wants to be understood.
The opening scene was deeply compelling and hooked me right at the first, as good writing must always do. There were many more moments like that opening scene throughout the book. I will be curious to see what he might think a decade from now about the narrative choices he made, particularly as it relates to some of the things he shared about his brother and sister-in-law. I was glad to listen to Prince Harry's account of his own life and thought it was well done.
Because of the world-wide interest in this book, I think he had the luxury of not having to necessarily concern himself with the reader or the universality that memoir generally needs to have. At times it felt like he got lost in his own narrative. But for the most part, I thought it was a well-written expression of his life (his ghostwriter, J.R. Moehringer, also wrote Andre Agassi's memoir, Open, so Prince Harry was certainly in expert hands.)
But back to my UK nostalgia. Though I read Spare when it first released in January 2023, I find myself thinking more about it this June and it’s brought up some half-thoughts about our own stories: the ones we live and the ones we tell.
Earlier this week I shared a handful of resources on Instagram for those who are becoming intentionally curious about their faith and the LGBTQ+ community. People are in wildly different places on this continuum, as we all know full well. It felt important to me to have a spot on Instagram - my most public platform - where people could see, learn, consider, and lurk anonymously if that’s what was needed. But of course when you share about a hot button topic that is important to you, the hot button comments will eventually roll in and of course they did.