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Post by Admin on Apr 15, 2020 18:32:44 GMT
As Princess Anne approaches her 70th birthday, the daughter of Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip isn't slowing down. She carried out 500 official engagements last year and is keenly aware of the changes in her family, including Prince Harry and Meghan Markle's recent decision to step down as working royals on March 31. Her brother, Prince Andrew, also retired from public duty last year after his controversial connections to the late billionaire Jeffrey Epstein. In a rare interview with royal expert Katie Nicholl for Vanity Fair, Anne opens up like never before about her duties and the younger generation of royals.  “I don’t think retirement is quite the same [for me],” she says. “Most people would say we’re very lucky not to be in that situation because you wouldn’t want to just stop. It is, to a large extent, the choice of the organizations you’re involved with and whether they feel you’re still relevant. But I think both my father and my mother have, quite rightly, made decisions about, you know, ‘I can’t spend enough time doing this and we need to find somebody else to do it’ because it makes sense. I have to admit they continued being there for a lot longer than I had in mind, but we’ll see.” Queen Elizabeth is nearing her 94th birthday, while Prince Philip is 98. Now, the younger generation of royals, mostly headed up by Prince William, Kate Middleton and their three children, have become the new face of the monarchy, taking on the brunt of the responsibilities. In the interview, Anne describes herself as “the boring old fuddy-duddy at the back saying, ‘Don’t forget the basics.’" She warns younger royals, “I don’t think this younger generation probably understands what I was doing in the past and it’s often true, isn’t it? You don’t necessarily look at the previous generation and say, ‘Oh, you did that?’ Or, ‘You went there?’ Nowadays, they’re much more looking for, ‘Oh let’s do it a new way.’ And I’m already at the stage, ‘Please do not reinvent that particular wheel. We’ve been there, done that. Some of these things don’t work. You may need to go back to basics.’"  The interview takes place shortly after Harry, 35, and Meghan, 38, announced their decision to give up their HRH titles and become financially independent from the royal family. Anne herself broke tradition with her children, Peter and Zara, opting not to give them HRH titles at birth. “I think it was probably easier for them, and I think most people would argue that there are downsides to having titles,” she says. “So I think that was probably the right thing to do.” Though Anne has gained a newfound popularity due to her portrayal by actress Erin Doherty on the most recent season of The Crown, a source tells Vanity Fair that she does not watch the Netflix series, as she “has no interest in watching her life acted out onscreen.” |
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Post by Admin on Apr 16, 2020 0:44:18 GMT
 Having divorced Captain Mark Phillips, her first husband and father of her children—Peter, 42, and Zara Tindall, 38—after 20 years of matrimony, the princess knows better than most people that marriages (perhaps particularly royal ones) aren’t always forever. A tabloid newspaper splashed the story of the impending divorce on its front page that morning, and I have been warned in advance by the press officer that the princess won’t discuss the separation. “We had a little conversation about it in the car, but she just rises above it,” confides her lady-in-waiting, who has known the princess for 30 years. The princess’s prickly relationship with the press is perhaps to be expected. Anne’s private life came under scrutiny when the same tabloid obtained the princess’s personal letters from the man who would become her husband of more than 25 years, Commander Timothy Laurence. In her youth she had a reputation for being a royal rebel. She is the only royal to have a criminal conviction (one of her dogs, a three-year-old English bull terrier called Dotty, attacked two children in a park in 2002—the princess pleaded guilty to being in charge of a dog that was out of control in a public area), and she was banned from driving for a month after repeatedly speeding, a trait her daughter, Zara (who was also recently banned from driving), appears to have inherited. Even now the princess generates headlines—not all positive—in the media.  Last year she became an internet sensation after she was caught on camera seeming to snub President Trump during a NATO leaders reception at Buckingham Palace. Footage from the event appears to show the queen beckoning her daughter to join the royal lineup. Instead, Anne shrugs her shoulders. Cue a thousand memes. According to sources who were in the room where it happened, Princess Anne had in fact thought she was being asked to see if anyone else was still waiting to meet the queen; she shrugged her shoulders because it was only her. She’s not on Twitter (her aides post on her behalf), so she was unaware of the commotion her casual shoulder shrug had caused. She was, however, made aware of another clip in which she was seen mingling with Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau, French president Emmanuel Macron, and British prime minister Boris Johnson. According to news outlets, the world leaders were laughing at Trump and his lengthy press conference earlier that day. “The princess was unhappy to be dragged into that particular story because she has always been careful not to be seen to be political in any way,” says a source. “She is also incredibly respectful, so any suggestion that she would laugh at anyone behind their backs was quite upsetting for her.” The royals are expected to be politically neutral and, like her mother, the princess has always been careful not to stray into the political arena. Avoiding family scandals has been trickier, and Anne won’t comment on the front-page story about her son’s divorce. “It’s still very raw,” says a source. Nevertheless there was no question of the princess sidestepping her work. She takes her commitments seriously. “She visits our local centers five or six times a year,” says McLean. “The amount of time she dedicates is remarkable. There’s a lot that goes on that isn’t in the public eye.” The princess spends an hour and a half (a long time for a royal engagement) at the center before heading to central London for her next appointment: the opening of a new biomedical imaging center at University College London, where she is chancellor. She is so enthralled during an examination of prostate cancer cells that her schedule runs over by half an hour, leaving her lady-in-waiting in a panic because the princess needs to get back to the palace before an evening engagement. The turnaround at St James’s Palace, where the princess has an apartment next to the Chapel Royal, is typically speedy; she chooses her own outfits, does her own makeup, and is even known to fix her own tiara if necessary. This particular day eventually wraps up late in the evening, after she has read her briefing papers ahead of the next day’s schedule. |
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Post by Admin on Apr 16, 2020 6:12:03 GMT
When I meet her at three o’clock the following afternoon at St James’s Palace, she has already opened a housing shelter and visited a rocking horse manufacturer in Kent before returning to Buckingham Palace via helicopter. She hasn’t paused for so much as a cup of tea—an aide says she never stops for refreshments until her schedule is over—and as she walks into the pale green sitting room overlooking Colour Court bathed in early spring sunshine, she extends a hand and smiles warmly. She’s elegant in a blue and red floral dress and matching jacket, with just a hint of red lipstick and the lightest dusting of powder. A few wisps of gray fleck her chestnut hair, and her complexion is flawless like her mother the queen’s. In fact, the similarity between mother and daughter is striking. She’s also wearing sensible court shoes, but her coltish legs and slender frame are the physique of a former athlete. In her youth, Anne was a champion sportswoman: the first member of the royal family to compete in the Olympics, in Montreal 1976, and the winner of three European Championship medals. Leapfrogged in succession by her younger brothers—Andrew, Duke of York, and Edward, Earl of Wessex—she was keen to make a name for herself as an equestrian.  “I thought if I was going to do anything outside of the royal family, horses was likely to be the best way of doing it,” she tells me. “But then you have to find the right horse at the right time. The original horse I rode was bred as a polo pony and should never have been an event horse, but it worked, so that was very satisfying. But I always knew it was going to be limited time.” The Princess Royal won the BBC Sports Personality of the Year in 1971, becoming the first royal to receive the title (her daughter, Zara, an Olympic equestrian, was also awarded the title in 2006). Though she has long been retired as a professional equestrian, the princess still rides for pleasure at her Gloucestershire home, Gatcombe Park, an 18th-century manor set in 730 acres of park, which was until last year home to the annual Gatcombe Horse Trials. The princess breeds horses there and helped teach her young grandchildren to ride in her very own paddocks. Anne has four grandchildren: Peter and Autumn’s two girls—Savannah, nine, and Isla, eight—and Zara’s daughters with her husband, Mike Tindall—Mia, six, and one-year-old Lena. All of them share a love of horses with their grandmother, who says, “Certainly when they started their riding lives I was the extra hand.” It’s when talking about the four young granddaughters that her eyes really light up. She hasn’t yet hosted a sleepover “because they have so many friends in the area,” but she clearly enjoys being a hands-on grandmother, particularly spending time outdoors. “I find it very difficult to understand why anybody gets sucked into screens and devices. Life’s too short, frankly. There’s more entertaining things to be done,” she says, adding “I suppose that puts me in the real dinosaur range.” Anne was neither antiquated nor rigid in her own child-rearing. Keen for Peter and Zara to have ordinary childhoods, she broke with royal tradition by choosing not to give them HRH titles when they were born, a peerage she would have been offered from the queen. “I think it was probably easier for them, and I think most people would argue that there are downsides to having titles,” she says. “So I think that was probably the right thing to do.” (Our interview happened to take place a month after Harry and Meghan announced they would be giving up their HRH titles.) |
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Post by Admin on Apr 16, 2020 18:27:18 GMT
 In keeping with family tradition, however, she sent Peter and Zara to the prestigious Gordonstoun school in Scotland where her father, the Duke of Edinburgh, and brother Prince Charles were boarders. The princess (patron of the Campaign for Gordonstoun) is a firm believer in the benefits of boarding school, having herself boarded at Benenden School in Kent (where she is also president of the Benenden School Society) in 1963. “My case was slightly different to my senior brother’s,” says Anne. (Charles is two years older than Anne, the queen’s second-born child, who was followed by Andrew, 10 years later, and Edward 4 years after that.) “I was ready to go to school. I had a governess and two friends and that was never going to be enough, really, so I was only too pleased to be sent off somewhere else. I think boarding school has been demonized by some when in fact it’s a very important aspect to have available and many children actually thrive in it. One of the other charities I got involved with was the Royal Wanstead Foundation, which is now the Royal National Children’s SpringBoard Foundation and takes children from chaotic homes and sends them to boarding schools. You only have to listen to them to realize that it’s absolutely transformed their lives.” While Charles had a miserable time at school, the princess’s children had happier experiences at Gordonstoun and have gone on to carve out careers independent of the royal family. Peter runs a successful sports and entertainment agency and organized a party for the queen’s 90th birthday. More recently he came under fire for using his royal status to promote Jersey milk in China, something his mother refuses to be drawn on. The Princess Royal is hugely proud of her daughter’s sporting achievements, particularly the memorable moment when she presented Zara with a silver medal at the 2012 Olympics. Anne is modest when I ask if talent runs down the tree. “Her father had been a successful equestrian and won a lot more medals [than I] so you do slightly wonder if having two parents who’ve been in that situation helped,” she says. “Zara was always a natural and it was really a question of whether she felt that was something she really wanted to do, and she did and she was very thorough and applied herself to it. So she was quite rightly very successful.” Much of the princess’s charity work involves horses. She supports, among other organizations, Riders for Health, the Horse Trust, and World Horse Welfare. One of the charities she has supported the longest, Riding for the Disabled Association, provides riding and carriage driving to differently abled people around the U.K. Like the queen, who still rides at 93, Princess Anne rides most days, which keeps her agile, mentally and physically. She still wears outfits she’s had since the ’80s—she is famous for recycling her wardrobe.  “Princess Anne is a true style icon and was all about sustainable fashion before the rest of us really knew what that meant,” says British Vogue editor Edward Enninful, who met the princess when she was presenting the Queen Elizabeth II Award for British Design during London Fashion Week in February. “She is timeless in her style, and she wears a tailored suit better than anyone else I can think of.” The princess is more self-deprecating, claiming she recycles “because I’m quite mean. I still try and buy materials and have them made up because I just think that’s more fun. It also helps to support those who still manufacture in this country. We mustn’t forget we’ve got those skills, and there are still places that do a fantastic job.” As president of the U.K. Fashion and Textile Association, she likes to fly the flag for British designers. “I very seldom buy anything which isn’t made in the U.K.,” she says, admitting a weakness for Harris Tweed. “It went through a phase when it was very fashionable. For me the point about it is that it looks exactly the same at the end of the day as it did at the beginning. Brilliant.” Her clothes need to be practical, given that she is in and out of trains, helicopters, and cars traveling the length and breadth of the country representing some of her 300-plus charities and military organizations on a daily basis. (She’s even been known to hop on the subway to get to an engagement. The casual princess—she’s just like us!) While much of her work goes unreported, Princess Anne has steadfastly held onto the title of Britain’s most industrious royal until last year when her brother, the Prince of Wales, eclipsed her by 15 engagements, after his own 70th-birthday year. The princess, who carried out more than 500 engagements last year, will at times pack four or five engagements a day into her itinerary, which she concedes sometimes makes it hard for her aides and advisers. “I make their lives more difficult in terms of the logistics, I’m afraid, but if I’m going to be in London, I don’t want to be hanging about. A lot of stuff goes on here, so there’s a question of filling in the time. I’m fortunate that the program that I make up is a direct result of being asked to do these things. It would be a pity if you didn’t try and do them.” |
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Post by Admin on Apr 18, 2020 5:12:39 GMT
“I don’t think retirement is quite the same [for me],” she says, smiling wryly. “Most people would say we’re very lucky not to be in that situation because you wouldn’t want to just stop. It is, to a large extent, the choice of the organizations you’re involved with and whether they feel you’re still relevant. But I think both my father and my mother have, quite rightly, made decisions about, you know, ‘I can’t spend enough time doing this and we need to find somebody else to do it’ because it makes sense. I have to admit they continued being there for a lot longer than I had in mind, but we’ll see.”  At 93 the queen is still working, while the Duke of Edinburgh announced his retirement in May 2017, having handed his patronage of the Commonwealth Study Conference Leaders over to his daughter. Anne cites both her parents as role models. One of her early royal appearances was standing on the palace balcony for her mother’s coronation in 1953, and although she has slipped to 14th in line to the throne—Anne falls behind her brothers, their children and grandchildren—she hasn’t let her commitment to the crown waver. Had she not been a royal, she says she would have been an engineer. “The practicalities of how things work, I think, was always interesting as far as I was concerned. But I think it was a little bit early in the sort of scheme of things to have gone down that route.” Instead she has made a point of championing women in her role as patron of Women into Science and Engineering. “I’ve certainly enjoyed being part of trying to encourage more girls to look at engineering as a realistic career.” She declines to identify herself as a feminist; rather she says she wants to see every young person achieve their full potential. She became patron of Opportunity International U.K. (which helps young entrepreneurs in some of the poorest countries in Africa) in 1998 to do just that, but she also remains steadfastly loyal to her oldest charities and is deeply proud of her 50 years of work with Save the Children, for which she was nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize. But she says it’s not her legacy that’s important but “whether the organization as a whole has made the sort of difference that it really wants to…. So, you know, you look at the Save the Children’s adverts and you think, Has nothing improved? When actually, yes it has, but that doesn’t get you any more funding.” “I don’t think this younger generation [of royals] probably understands what I was doing in the past.” “It’s not just about, Can I get a tick in the box for doing this? No, it’s about serving…. It comes from an example from both my parents’ way of working and where they saw their role being. I mean, my father served. It was a more direct form of service, I suppose you could argue. And the queen’s has been a lifelong service in a slightly different way, but they both have that perspective of service which is about working with people.” Remarkably for someone who has always seemed so driven and confident, it took her time to find her voice on the world stage. “It took me probably 10 years before I really felt confident enough to contribute to Save the Children’s public debates, because you needed to understand how it works on the ground and that needed a very wide coverage. So my early trips were really important.” And she worries that the younger generation of royals may be in too much of a hurry to change the royal family’s tried and tested approach when it comes to philanthropy. Describing herself as “the boring old fuddy-duddy at the back saying, ‘Don’t forget the basics,’ ” she cautions, “I don’t think this younger generation probably understands what I was doing in the past and it’s often true, isn’t it? You don’t necessarily look at the previous generation and say, ‘Oh, you did that?’ Or, ‘You went there?’ Nowadays, they’re much more looking for, ‘Oh let’s do it a new way.’ And I’m already at the stage, ‘Please do not reinvent that particular wheel. We’ve been there, done that. Some of these things don’t work. You may need to go back to basics.’ ” Over the years the princess has traveled extensively, clocking up visits to Bangladesh, Sierra Leone, South Africa, Mozambique, Ethiopia, and Bosnia and Herzegovina with Save the Children, but she has reluctantly scaled back her overseas travel in part because of logistics and in part because the younger royals do the lion’s share of overseas work. |
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