As teasers of teasers go, the trailers released for the TV interviews in which the Duke of Sussex promotes his memoir, Spare, were very short.
In one, confronting Tom Bradby, a coup for the ITV news presenter and former royal correspondent whom he has known for around 20 years, Prince Harry says: “I would like to have my father back , I wish I had my brother back.”
The clips cut to him saying “it was never meant to be” and “I want a family, not an institution”, as he claims it was appropriate to paint him and his wife, Meghan, as “sinkholes”.
In another clip, with Anderson Cooper of CBS News’ 60 Minutes, Harry tackles the subject of royal correspondents, his bete noire and alleged collusion with Buckingham Palace “in the briefing and the leaks and the planting stories against me and my wife.”.
The clips are a minute long each, but have predictably precipitated a tsunami of outrage. Indefatigable columnists have kissed deep into the well of indignant metaphor and adjective; a well that must surely be about to run dry given the excess Sussex publicity it has booked this Christmas.
“Beware of Windsors, bitter Harry re-heats his spleen soup,” read one headline, while others described him as rubbish at his family or engaged in a cynical cash-in-a-story exercise which was “short-lived”. “.
There has been silence from Buckingham Palace and Kensington Palace, at least in public, with sources clearly indicating there is no desire to do so.
But will the royals pass over the Spare book when it is published on Tuesday? The trailers for the two interviews, both of which will air on Sunday, revisit similar themes to those aired in Netflix’s six-part documentary series Harry & Meghan, which aired last month. Family fractures, press intrusion, the accusation of not protecting the couple, apparently affected both the institution and the family.
The royal family’s mantra, according to Harry, is: “Never complain, never explain.” But he says in the CBS clip that it’s “just a slogan” and that there’s a lot of complaining going on behind the scenes. It implies that it manifests itself in “spoon-fed stories” to a complacent press.
So far, the contents of the “French” memos have not been leaked. An unnamed source, said to be familiar with the book, told the Sunday Times: “I generally think the book [will be ] worse for them than the royal family expects. Everything is exposed. Charles is doing better than I expected, but it’s tough on William, in particular, and even Kate has a bit of a face.”
It wasn’t long ago that the palace’s PR machine pulled off a triumphant coup with the ‘Fabulous Four’ of William, Kate, Harry and Meghan reuniting briefly and smiling for a stroll in Windsor immediately after the death of the queen . Perhaps Harry’s book will pull back the curtain on this, along with other narratives the public is fed daily about “the company”.
If any of the royals react publicly, the bookies’ money would go to the Prince of Wales. Harry has already alleged that his brother shouted and shouted at him during the Sandringham meeting that sealed the Sussexes’ exit from the UK and the royal fold.
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It was William, moved by Harry and Meghan’s public suggestion that the royal family was racist, who couldn’t help but respond when asked by a TV reporter: “We’re not a racist family.”
Perhaps what will cut William the deepest, however, is his brother’s monopolization of the memory of their mother, Diana, Princess of Wales. Harry has spoken many times about the lasting psychological impact of her untimely death on him.
Without any protocol, he has claimed it publicly, again and again, and there is every expectation that this will form a major part of the book. ITV, promoting the interview, said Harry would talk about his personal relationships and “unheard details” surrounding his death. But Diana left behind two boys.
As for the king, sources regularly say the door is always open for Harry and Meghan. It would certainly take a very deep rift for Charles not to invite his youngest son to his coronation on May 6, or for Harry to decline the invitation. Whether Spare’s publication could be the catalyst for that, or some form of reconciliation, will only become apparent once it hits the shelves.