Kate, Letizia, Mette-Marit and Mary vs the press

The poll is now closed and it's honours even among the queens competing for title of most misunderstood. Margaret of Anjou and Anne Boleyn got 50% of the votes each with no one thinking poor old Isabella, the She Wolf of France has been harshly treated by history.

 

Margaret of Anjou and Anne Boleyn - misunderstood queen consorts of England

  

But why is their reputation so harsh?  Part of it is to do with how they were represented at the time.  Neither took any prisoners - well, Margaret did but she soon got rid of them - and their uncompromising outlook put them at odds with the idea of being a woman and a queen at the time and with the powerful courtiers whose prestige they undermined.  So does it all come down to getting a bad press?

 

How else does the story of a queen consort or one in waiting come to us other than in other people's words?  It's still not the done thing for these women to speak for themselves.  Royalty might be at the top of the tree in their own countries but they're one of the few groups of people without a voice of their own.  The magic of monarchy for many is in its mystique but if does that leave it open to misinterpretation? 

 

 

Kate is used to being on the front pages but future historians will know far more about her from what other people say than from the Duchess herself

 

The queens in waiting in Europe are a case in point.  Kate, Mary and Mette-Marit were all subjected to intense public scrutiny before getting engaged to their princes while Letizia found her life being picked apart after her marriage, such was the speed and surprise of her engagement. Who comes out best and who is the most misunderstood of our modern monarchs in waiting?

 

That's the poll this week - which future queen consort is having the hardest time in the way her story is being told?  Kate of Cambridge is riding a wave of public support and the moment, just two years into her royal marriage and about to deliver the future heir to the throne?  But she's had her moments and spent years being dubbed Waity Katie by some as her courtship with William spanned nearly a decade before they wed.  That will be part of the tale told by future historians - how fair is it?

 

 

Kate got her prince but they married almost ten years after first meeting - how will history tell that part of the duchess' story?

(Tom Soper Photography)

 

Because once there's a ring of some sorts on your finger then a princess in waiting gets a lot more protection than a possible princess.  Mary of Denmark also had a long courtship with her prince charming allowing the press to pick over every aspect of her life and character.  From meeting Crown Prince Frederick at the Sydney Olympics in 2000 to the announcement of her engagement in Octobr 2003 she was subject to intensive press scrutiny, even after her move to Denmark ahead of the marriage being confirmed. 

 

 

Mary Elizabeth Donaldson had three years of press scrutiny before she married the Crown Prince of Denmark

(photo Visit Copenhagen)

Mette Marit of Norway had a lot to pick over from her pre-princess days but however much help and protection royal houses try to give the girlfriends of the kings to be, there's only so much they can do.  Mette-Marit had to protect her young son as well and the fact that she was a single mother gave the papers plenty to talk about.  Once safely ensconced in the royal fold the questions are answered for you by press officers but how much of the way Mette-Marit's tale was told before her engagement will stick to her future appearances in the history books?

Crown Princess Mette-Marit of Norway had a lot for the press to chew over as she continued the relationship with Haakon Magnus that would lead to the throne

(photo Frankie Fouagnthin)

 

No such problems for Letizia whose engagement to Felipe of Spain was a surprise to many when it was announced on Spanish TV on a Saturday afternoon late in 2003.  With hardly anyone knowing that the couple were seeing one another, there were no tricky questions to answer for this future queen consort even though she was on TV every day reading the news.  Given that Felipe's previous girlfriends had seen their lives examined in close detail, it's no surprise he wanted to keep his latest relationship quiet but it did mean that a lot of the chatting that inevitably accompanies the arrival of a new royal love interest needed to find an outlet at a later date.  Would Letizia have got an easier ride from the press in the long run if she'd enjoyed a longer courtship?

 

 

Letizia of Spain was a well known journalist before she started making the headlines herself

(photo Holger Motzkau)

 

Later this week we'll look at how these princesses' stories have been told after their marriages and whether the press takes a different stance when a royal girlfriend becomes a wife.  And then there's the poll - which queen consort in waiting has had it hardest from the papers, TV and radio covering their lives, the voices that are the real historians of today?