'Cunning plans of a visionary' Charles: The Heart of a King review

4 / 5 stars
Charles: The Heart of a King

ROYAL biographies are often heralded with sensational headlines about revelations that will supposedly rock the throne.

By Richard Palmer, Royal Correspondent

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The heir to the throne is not afraid to tackle the tough issues

CHARLES: THE HEART OF A KING **** by Catherine Mayer W H Allen, £20

So it was with Catherine Mayer's portrait of the Prince of Wales, the latest in a long line of biographies of the heir apparent, when the pre–publication material surfaced a couple of weeks ago.

Mayer, a London–based American journalist with Time magazine, has produced a vivid and entertaining account of the extraordinary life of the man born to be King in this detailed but unauthorised biography.

Yet anyone expecting a hatchet job full of damaging disclosures is destined to be disappointed. It is a pretty fair and rounded account of Prince Charles, his passions and contradictions. How does a man with a gigantic carbon footprint, travelling around the world and flitting between numerous royal residences, come to lecture us about our wasteful ways?

Newspapers have highlighted Mayer's coverage of tensions within the Royal Family and the Royal Household over Charles's plans to become an activist King.

The Queen, it is said, is unhappy at the prospect of him trying to use his powers as monarch to bring together world leaders and experts and raise concerns about controversial issues. Quite how Charles will use his powers as monarch while trying to stay out of politics is unclear.

Mayer produced one eye–catching quote from a former royal aide who revealed that there is so much infighting among courtiers anxious for the ear of the Prince that Clarence House is known as Wolf Hall, after Hilary Mantel's fictionalised account of the backstabbing court of Henry VIII. But there are many other vignettes that provide us with a new picture of the heir.

Mayer tells us he likens himself to Baldrick, the filthy servant in Blackadder who always has a cunning plan. He nearly jilted Diana on the eve of their doomed 1981 marriage.

His first meeting with the real love of his life, Camilla came when they were introduced by mutual friend Lucia de Santa Cruz, in 1971. It was she who made reference to Camilla's ancestor Alice Keppel's affair with Edward VII, according to Mayer.

BUT perhaps the most stunning revelation is her suggestion that Charles does not enjoy novels and may not have read one since Anna Karenina when he was a Cambridge student. Instead he prefers history and philosophy, with his belief in the universal truths of ancient religions, not just the one he will one day head as Supreme Governor of the Church of England.

At 400 pages Mayer's account is perhaps overlong. Her great strength, in an age when too many royal watchers are afraid of criticising the monarchy, is that she is not afraid to tackle head–on the big questions that may make Charles a good but controversial King, not the great unifier that his mother has been.

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