The most natural feelings are those we are least willing to confess, and among them is fatuity.
Honoré de Balzac - Gambara (1837)
As much of the world must know by now, King Charles has an undisclosed form of cancer. I wish him well, but it raises a detached perspective in that he is just another chap from my generation unfortunate enough to have cancer.
The detached perspective also wonders why we pretend that this very ordinary man is a monarch. Officially of course he certainly is a monarch, but the role degenerated long ago to that of a figurehead and most of that is a willingness to pretend he is something more.
It's not easy to say whether this is healthy or not, this willingness to pretend. Sometimes justified by the horrible prospect of President Blair as an alternative which is pretty convincing.
Yet so often it's what we go for - the lesser of two evils. Understandable enough, but there is a certain fatuity about it. The fatuity is there in the background now.
4 comments:
It's like when someone waits all their life to retire, then has a heart attack. He's waited all his life to be a king...
Bucko - yes, apart from anything else he must think he's drawn the short straw.
"Very ordinary man"?
Like you, I wish him well, especially as he is denied the chance to take stock and get well in privacy.
But if you met him down the pub, you'd think him an imperious loon, wouldn't you...
Sam - yes, with his history he'd be an imperious loon, but without that he's ordinary, nothing to set him apart.
Post a Comment