Memoir by Diana’s brother launched
Spencer criticized the palace’s implication that his grief had affected his recollection.
Spencer criticized the palace’s implication that his grief had affected his recollection.
London (afp) — Charles Spencer’s book about his late sister, Princess Diana, packed with explosive revelations is published Tuesday, after searing extracts prompted a rare and sharp rebuttal from King Charles III.
Almost three decades after Diana was killed in a car crash in Paris in 1997, people remain fascinated by her life and tragic death.
“Swan Song: Diana, My Sister,” a memoir written by Diana’s younger brother, has been published by Penguin and translated into 12 languages.
But extracts serialized in the British tabloid the Daily Mail over the past few days have triggered sensational headlines.
Spencer has said he wrote the book to “speak on Diana’s behalf” and correct “untruths that have become accepted over time.”
“Diana would be cheering from the rafters at this book, I have no doubt about that,” he told the Mail on Sunday at the weekend.
Published excerpts claimed her ex-husband Charles, then Prince of Wales, and now the king, told Spencer in a phone call shortly after Diana’s death: “Rest assured, we’ll forget her soon enough.”
Her death, aged just 36, sparked an outpouring of grief in Britain for the woman dubbed “the people’s princess.”
And it triggered accusations that the then monarch, Queen Elizabeth II, failed to respond swiftly with empathy and understanding.
Spencer claimed Charles had “sounded giddily elated, like a lottery winner” at the news of Diana’s demise.
And he said Charles “went ballistic” after he insisted Diana would not have wanted her sons, princes William and Harry, then aged 15 and 12, to walk behind her coffin in her funeral procession.
A Buckingham Palace spokesperson issued a rare reaction from the 77-year-old king, saying: “His Majesty is mindful that the pain of fraternal grief can cloud reason, affect judgement and color memory in ways others do not recognize, even many years after such a loss.”
“The king is plainly furious, Buckingham Palace almost never issues any statement like that,” BBC journalist Laura Kuenssberg said during a Friday interview.
“Those are exactly the words he said,” Spencer assured her, adding: “I don’t hear (King Charles) saying he didn’t say that.”
Spencer criticized the palace’s implication that his grief had affected his recollection, telling The Mail on Sunday: “It is not every day you wake up to find you’ve been gaslit by the king.”
He also dubbed it a “rather poor imitation” of the palace’s response to Prince Harry and his wife Meghan’s claims of royal racism five years ago — which was that “recollections may vary.”
