Hot History - Prinny Di Forever

Episode Date: November 24, 2023

Today we deep dive into the life of Diana Spencer, Princess of Wales. Looking at her relationship with Charles, the wider royal family, her motherhood, charitable works, and of course her tragic death we see the long-lasting legacy of one of the UK's most mourned public figures. TW: this episode references eating disorders and self-harm which some listeners may find disturbing.

This episode of Hot History contains reference to eating disorders and self-harm that some listeners may find disturbing. If you or someone you know is struggling from an eating disorder, call the Butterfly National Helpline on 1-800-33-4-6-7-3. If you or someone you know is struggling with thoughts of self-harm, please call Lifeline on 1311-14. Hello and welcome back to another episode of Hot History, the podcast where we talk about the things in history that you probably should know, but don't. I'm so excited to have you listening along, especially if you are a watcher of the crown, because today we are looking at the incredible and tragic life of the people's princess, Diana, Princess of Wales.

Is in session. There is perhaps no other personality in the last 100 years who has had such an emotional influence on the lives of so many people as that of Lady Diana Spencer. The only British woman to marry an heir to the throne in over three hundred. hundred years, she was princess by 20, mother to the future king of England by 21, and tragically dead at the age of 36. So let's start to unpack the life of Lady Die. Born on July 1st, 1961, she was the youngest daughter of the 8th Earl of Spencer, making her Lady Diana. The Spencer family lived in Ulthirp House, a massive mansion located in Northamptonshire, where Diana

and her siblings spent their youth. But how did she get involved with the royal family? Well, the Spencers had ties to the royals for many years before Diana was even born, with her father acting as equerry to King George the 6th, and her late majesty, Queen Elizabeth II, between 1950 to 1954. Lady Diane Prince Charles had also been neighbours at Sandringham for many years, but it wasn't until 1977 when the prince was invited to a weekend at Althorpe as he was dating Diana's oldest sister that the pair were really introduced, and in 1980 they began dating, which is when most of the world.

was introduced to her. Their relationship was a whirlwind and emotions ran high. Charles had just broken up with his girlfriend and his adoptive grandfather Lord Mountbatten had just died. Diana letter said in an interview that she said to Charles, you must be so lonely. You need someone beside you. His response to this show of empathy in Dye's own words were that he leapt upon me and started kissing me. And it's not surprising. The Windsor family is known for its stiff upper lip. So expression of feeling was not something that Charles had much received. After a few months of dating, Charles surprised Diana by proposing on February 3, 1981. As she later recalled to Andrew Morton for her biography, Diana, her true story in her own worlds,

Charles said, will you marry me? And I laughed. I remember thinking, this is a joke. And I said, yeah, okay, but he was deadly serious. The pair announced their engagement on February 24, 1981. During the photo call, Diana showed off her stunning sapphire engagement ring. She picked the legendary accessory from Garad, the Crown's, Jewelers' Catalogue, a choice that was actually quite scandalous amongst the family members at the time. The reception to the pair's engagement was enormous, and her beauty and shy demeanour, which earned her the nickname Shy Die, made her an instant sensation with the media and the public,

but it was not without its trials. When reporters told the pair that you both look very much in love, Diana replied, Oh yes, absolutely. But Charles, however, answers whatever in love means. Diana laughed it off, with Charles adding to the phrase, In love is really open to your own interpretation. Diana later revealed, I thought, what a strange answer. God, it absolutely traumatized me.

Biddle Smith, who wrote the royal biography, Prince Charles, the passions and paradoxes of an improbable life, said it was a totally inappropriate thing for him to say but understandable given the way his mind worked which again we must remember when looking at Charles that his family was not the easiest environment to grow up in this comment was not the only bump in their road to the altar for in the early stages of the engagement Diana began to suspect something was amiss which is where we meet Camilla Parker Bowles Camilla first met Charles in 1970 at a polo match where she reportedly joked saying,

My great-grandmother was the mistress of your great-great-grandfather. The pair started dating but Charles left to serve in the Navy. When he returned, she was engaged to Charles's sister, Princess Anne's, ex, the Army Cavalry Officer Andrew Parker Bowles. Charles and Camilla remained friends after her marriage, which is when it all goes downhill. Morton recounts that Diana was upset when she found out that Charles had gifted Camilla a bracelet shortly before the royal wedding. The event upset her so much that she called her sister saying she wanted to call it off,

to which her sister replied, Your face is on the teetown now. And Diana wasn't the only one with apprehensions. Royal expert, Ingrid Seward, noted that hours before the wedding, Charles told his friends would just have nothing in common. And let us remember here, Charles is 32 years old and Diana is only 20. But the wedding goes ahead on July 29, 1981, being watched worldwide by over 7,000. 750 million people.

A staggeringly large number, perhaps not when compared to the neat 2 billion viewers who watched William and Catherine Mary in 2011, but for 30 years prior, it was astonishing. And the public reception showed the royal family and indeed the world, that the love for Diana now styled the Princess of Wales and for the pair, as a couple, was real. In August that same year, they set off on their two-week honeymoon cruising through the the Mediterranean. And here, the wedding bliss wore off very quickly. Penny Juna, biographer to Camilla, wrote that the just-married princess was upset when she found a photo of Camilla in Charles's diary while the couple were honeymooning. Charles's valet, Stephen Barry, also said

that the prince simply had to be in constant contact with Camilla or he couldn't function properly. Diana's youth and naivety as to what marrying into the royal family was like, frustrated Charles, who found her unruly and immature, a contrast to the mature and level-headed Camilla. Diana became ever too aware of her comparison to Mrs. Parker Bowles, which manifested itself in her bulimia. She'd struggled with the disorder for months before the honeymoon came around. She later recalled that during our engagement, my husband put his hand on my waistline and said, oh, a bit chubby here, aren't me? And that triggered something off inside of me. She also told Andrew Morton that the Camilla thing, I was desperate, desperate, I remember the first time I made myself sick.

It wasn't all doom and gloom, though, for on November 5th, 1981, the couple announced they were pregnant with their first child. So with the heir to the house of Windsor on the way, one would think that the pair could not be more overjoyed. However, the reality was far from the fairy tale. Diana recalls being desperate for feeling from her husband, telling Morton that I threw myself down the same. stairs at Sandringham. Charles said I was crying, woof, and I said I felt so desperate, and he said, I'm not going to listen. He went out riding, and when he came back, you know, it was just dismissal, total, dismissal. Diana struggled, continued throughout the later stages of her pregnancy, saying that William had to be induced because I couldn't handle the press pressure any longer.

And so William was born at the private Lindo Wing at St Mary's Hospital in London, following a 16-hour labor. Diana broke with royal traditions in many ways when it came to her motherhood. She was the first royal to give birth in a hospital versus a palace, favoured a natural birth, and also breastfed her babies herself. Diana took being a mother extremely seriously and indeed motherhood became the driving force of her life, but it was not without initial struggle. She told Morton, I was unwell with postnatal depression, which no one ever discusses. You have to read about it afterwards, also revealing that she had received a great deal of treatment and admission, which helped remove a lot of stigma around mental health at the time.

Diana continued to be a trailblazer against Royal Protocol when her and Charles set off for a six-week tour of Australia and New Zealand. The tradition had been for children to be left in the care of their nannies, but she insisted that William accompanied them. On this trip, Charles began to see how much attention Diana attracted. He told AIDS at the time, they've come out to see my wife. They haven't come out to see me. A concept which Charles, as future king of Britain, was not familiar with. Diana later confirmed saying that I felt very uncomfortable with it,

and I felt it was unfair because with the media attention came a lot of jealousy. A great deal of complicated situations arose because of that. The tour, however, was a success publicly, and the pair returned to England with William. Camilla steed cleared of Diana in these early days of the marriage, avoiding events where she knew the royal couple would be in attendance, the result of which gave the pair Prince Harry, born in 1984. With her boys, Diana was always loving and full of affection. She sent both of them to school rather than having governesses, as was the tradition. This was also Diana's way of ensuring her children experienced as much of the world outside of

the royal family as possible. Interviewed for a 2017 TV documentary, Will you remembered that she understood there was a real life outside. of palace walls. She also made sure the boys had fun. From eating McDonald's to holidays, including an Austrian ski trip in 1991, to days out, including several visits to Thorpe Park, theme park. It was around this time that Diana started the most important of her charitable works. In April, 1987, at the height of the AIDS epidemic, she opened the UK's first HIV AIDS unit. Photographs of her taken at the event have become synonymous with her legacy for kindness, showing her shaking hands with a HIV positive man without gloves.

At the time, many believed incorrectly that you could catch HIV through touch. Her actions were revolutionary in convincing the public there was nothing to be afraid of. This work was so important to Diana that she included her children. When asked about her motivation for including them, she said, I want them to have an understanding of people's emotions, people's insecurities, people's distress and people's hopes and dreams. I would like a monarchy that has more contact with its people. And while she was making leaps and bounds in her work, Diana was sure that Charles had rekindled a relationship with Camilla, which was true. The pair starting their affair

just two years after Harry was born in 1986. Diana told Morton of an event where she confronted Camilla. Diana recalled that when Camilla asked what more the princess could want on top of public adoration and her beautiful children, Diana replied, I want my husband. The pair lived separately and Diana began having affairs of her own. In August 1992, the couple's separation was revealed when a phone conversation between Princess Diana and a friend was late, where she spoke of her unhappy marriage. In December of that year, the couple announced their separation. Fast forward to January 1993 and we have Tampon Gate, a six-minute-long telephone call between Charles and Camilla that was released which was basically watered down aristocratic phone sex. Also key to note here,

Camela is also married to her husband, Andrew Parker Bowles, and would remain married to him until 1995. This led Charles to admit to his infidelity in 1994, an event which led to perhaps the most well-recognised Princess Diana moment of all time, the revenge dress. Diana attended an event at London's Serpentine Gallery, the same day Charles's interview aired, wearing a tight, off the shoulder number, which most definitely did not meet Royal Protocol. The dresser's designer revealed that it had actually been made for Diana three years prior. At the time the princess had been too nervous to wear it because it was a bit too daring and a last-minute wardrobe switch for the now famous dress was made. But it

didn't stop there. Diana did her now infamous Panorama interview in 1995 telling the BBC's Martin Bashir, well there were three of us in this marriage, so it was a bit crowded. A later investigation would conclude that Diana's brother, Earl Spencer, was deceived and induced by Bashir to arrange a meeting with the princess, which led to the BBC to issue an apology in 2021 and ultimately stated that they would never re-air the interview. Diana's fractured relationship with Charles is said to have become better-natured after their divorce in 1996, with the two seeking to be amicable co-parents, but the public opinion for Camilla was incredibly sour. In the years since, many have acknowledged that to attribute Charles and Diana's marital

problems solely to Camilla is a gross oversimplification. Diana, after all, was just a teenager when she met Charles, who was almost 13 years her senior, and their characters simply were not compatible. In the years after her divorce, Diana carried on with her charity works, most significantly her work with landmides. Diana also had a few rumoured boyfriends, including James Hewitt, formal cavalry officer, and Hasnuck Khan, a British Pakistani surgeon, but it was her relationship with Doty Al-Fayyed, which is remembered.

Doty and Diana spent time together in the South of France in 1997, where they are snapped by paparazzi photographer Mario Brenner, who sells the picture to the Sunday mail for record-breaking prices. A series of paparazzi shots would ensue from her time in Centropay, most notably the famous photograph of her sitting on the diving board. And this wasn't new to Diana, though. The British paparazzi earned a reputation for closely following her every move, and she was the most photographed person in the world.

In 1993, Diana sued the Mirror Group newspaper for publishing pictures of her working out in a gym, even calling them out in the streets saying, You make my life hell. But it was nothing compared to the hounding she received on August 30, 1997, when her and Doty flew to Paris. When they arrived, they go to the Ritz. which is owned by Muhammad al-Faed, Doty's father. That same day, Doty also goes to a jewelry store in Paris

to pick up a ring the pair reportedly chose in Monaco. At approximately 20 minutes after midnight, they leave the hotel. With paparazzi in pursuit, their car crashes in the pont down the tunnel. Doty dies instantly, and early of the morning of August 13th, Diana is also declared dead. The outcry of grief from her death was something that the world has never seen before. Thousands paid tribute at Buckingham Palace and wept in the streets. The royal family was infamously silent in their response to her death,

the Queen addressing the nation five days later. It was in this time that Tony Blair would make his famous speech calling her the People's Princess, a title that sticks with her until this very day. At her funeral, which was attended by thousands and watched by millions, William 15 and Harry 12 walked behind their mother's coffin alongside Earl Spencer, Diana's brother, Charles and the late Duke of Edinburgh. Earl Spencer expressed his disdain at this, saying that he had been lied to by Palace Cordiers

about the two princes wanting to walk behind their mother's coffin, saying that it was the most horrifying half an hour of my life. In recent years, Prince Harry has spoken about his grief, saying I don't think any child should be asked to do that under any circumstances, and I don't think it would happen today. Harry also spoke about his feelings towards the press, stating I was so angry with what happened to her, and the fact that there was no justice at all. The same people that chased her into the tunnel photograph her dying on the backseat of the car. And these views were shared by many. A 1997 poll found that 43% of Brits thought photographers were extremely responsible for the accident that led to Diana's death. In the years following, both William and Harry went to

University and join the armed forces. William meets a young Catherine Middleton at college and the pair beginner relationship that ends with a fairy tale wedding and three beautiful children. Harry, amid a fair bit of scandal and time in the press, also found love with his wife, Megan, and their two children. Charles and Camilla also continued their relationship and a gesture of respect to the late princess they waited until 2005 to finally get married themselves, with the Duchess of Cornwall, now Queen, opting not to take on. on the title Princess of Wales, a title which was just bestowed to Catherine, fitting for the young beautiful British woman who also wears her iconic engagement ring.

Love for Princess Diana has remained throughout the generations and a recent poll in 2018 found that Princess Diana is Britain's most mourned public figure, a sign of her lasting legacy a quarter of a century after her death. So we've covered about 36 years of history from Diana's birth to her tragic passing. But where does she sit in? time. She was born the same year as Ricky Chavez, George Clooney and Billy Ray Cyrus. She died the same year as Mother Teresa, 52 years after Anne Frank and exactly one year before the first IMAQ was released. She also died the same year Goodwill Hunting, Titanic and my best friend's wedding all hit cinemas. She was alive for the moon landing, the assassination of Martin Luther King and the invention

of the Sony Walkman. And we've already touched on this, but what impact does she have on modern society. Her status as an international icon allowed her to use her celebrity to raise awareness for a number of causes, from leprosy to domestic violence to the removal of landmines. Diana helped destigmatize a number of illnesses from HIV AIDS to mental illness, something that has been particularly important, not just in the work of her sons, but in modern society. She led the way in a new warm and affectionate form of royalty. Robert Lacey, historical consultant of the Crown said that one of the things that Diana introduced into modern royalty was the concept of conveying a sense of caring for people. And that's perhaps the part that you're all

here for. What interpretations of her are there in pop culture? With the brand new season of the Crown airing on Netflix just last week, let's start there. Now I love the Crown as a dramatized, embellished retelling of events and let me tell you, you are going to need a stone cold heart not to be moved by the portrayal of Diana by Australia's very own Elizabeth Debeki. I cried pretty much non-stop through episode three and four as the events of her and Doty Alphaiad's relationship and death play out like snot, running, eyes, burning, headache, thumping, level of weeping. Emma Corrin first picked up the manil as Diana in season three or four, but these last two

seasons by Debeki have been nothing short of breathtaking. The mannerisms, the raw honesty and above all the, the real understanding I feel Elizabeth has for the life of Diana is astonishing. Again, the Crown is a dramatic and embellished retelling of events and not a true non-fiction account. It is, of course, also biased, as many accounts regarding Diana are. The idea of the beautiful princess being betrayed by the prince and the institution who showed her no feeling is an easy sell and often over-dramatized. Diana has appeared in many other films and TV series.

she was played by Kristen Stewart, who received her best actress Oscar Nom in Spencer, and Naomi Watts played her in Diana. The song, Candle in the Wind, was released in 1997 by Elton John as a tribute to the late princess, modifying the lyrics to make it unique to her. And while some have liked to believe that Michael Jackson's dirty Diana was perhaps inspired by the princess, it was not. Although she did love it and asked Michael to perform her for her once, a prospect, which they both found. immensely funny. And that brings us to the end of another episode of Hot History. If you'd like to support us, then you can find us on Spotify and Apple Podcasts as Hot History. Follow us on TikTok at hot.com at Hot. History Club. As always, it is a pleasure getting down and dirty in time

with you and tune in next time as we discuss the brutal, bashful King Henry the 8th.