She’s had mixed luck with Australian prime ministers — some of whom, like Bob Hawke and Paul Keating, were Republicans (Keating famously laid a hand on her during her 1992 visit. Michelle Obama did the same in 2009, but the Queen doesn’t seem to mind at all ).
Other Australian Prime Ministers have been big fans – notably Robert Menzies, John Howard and Tony Abbott.
The latter even asked for an audience while in London after being ousted from the Prime Minister’s office. Her Majesty had no place in her diary.
Malcolm Turnbull had a bob in each direction.
“Even Republicans like me can be . . . very strong Elizabethans,” he said.
She was the world’s most famous woman (and one of the richest), a matriarch whose lavish family lingerie was not only broadcast publicly, but secretly taped, photographed with a long lens, and adapted into a Netflix series.
She was the ultimate celebrity, but she met her celebrity with restraint and a hard wall of protective protocol.
She received people, which means she let people come to her – the ultimate power flex.
But she was so speechless that she had to use the purse placement and brooch selection to signal her true thoughts.
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Because here was the thing: Elizabeth II’s intimacy and consistency never equaled intimacy.
And therein lies her secret and the mysticism of the monarchy that ruled her.
She was hyper-visible, but we never knew her opinions, her thoughts, or her feelings.
We knew a lot about what happened to her, but not a lot about how it made her feel.
The closest we got was when she described 1992 as her “annus horribilis,” but even then she could have been talking about her children’s divorce, or her sister’s health, or the Windsor Castle fire, or maybe something else entirely, like the death of a popular corgi. We never knew.
As she got older, the royal family became more and more incontinent with their problems.
There Charles was recorded on the phone with his mistress Camilla relaying his fantasies. There was Fergie on the front page of a tabloid. There was Princess Margaret’s descent into alcoholism.
And there was the tragedy and menace of Diana, who was of the monarchy and yet opposed it.
Diana was the worst kind of threat—she was loved, but most importantly, she talked.
She turned the tables on the discreet queen, who suddenly found her silence working against her.
The public wanted an answer, and in penance for Diana’s death in 1997, they wanted the Queen to speak. Eventually, even if she had to be urged, she turned to her grieving nation.
The disasters subsided for a while before flaring up again – the Queen’s son Prince Andrew, who was rumored to be her favourite, had fallen out of favor over his association with a notorious pedophile who offered him wealth and influence.
Then there was her grandson, Prince Harry, who, like his father, married a woman who chose not to play by royal rules; who wanted to take off on their own terms.
Harry and Meghan could not have chosen a more American way for their self-expression.
The stiff upper lip of the Queen’s monarchy gave way to the talk-it-all-outism of an Oprah Winfrey special that aired in 2021. Where Diana had accused The Firm of callousness, Meghan accused her of callousness and racism.
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The Queen was once again forced to show her feelings, just a little.
She issued a statement saying her family was “saddened to learn the full extent of how challenging the past few years have been for Harry and Meghan.”
The matter, she said, is being handled privately.
As she shrank in stature, she appeared less and less. One of her most memorable appearances was at the funeral of her 73-year-old husband, Prince Philip, in April 2021.
She sat alone and hunched, isolated by the COVID restrictions, mourning in a pew in St George’s Chapel.
She looked very lonely. She looked very much like Our Queen, who always put dignity over sincerity and form over emotion.
After Philip’s death, her frail health and mobility issues forced her to admit that she could not always keep calm and carry on, even canceling her performances at the opening of Britain’s Parliament.
Her moments in public were now brief and infrequent, and yet they cost her.
Even in the last photo released before her death, as she held out a bruise-sprinkled hand to her 15th Prime Minister, Liz Truss, that regal smile was there, even as she tightly clutched the walking stick that kept her upright. As always, she was doing her best at the moment, but she was holding back.