Happy (almost) New Year, everyone. I didn’t write one of these posts last year, but I did in 2017, and I think they’re worth doing as we level-set before 2020. Royal watching is fun for history and fashion lovers (and maybe gossip lovers?), but it’s very easy to get bogged down in the minutia and lose the forest through the trees. The last three years have been eventful for the British Royal Family, but I think it’s worth recognizing that so many of the micro-dramas we’re watching play out are dictated by a macro- one: we’re in the last years of Elizabeth II’s reign and the family is positioning itself, organically and otherwise, for what will likely prove one of the most momentous occasions in its history.
And I say that, yes, with full knowledge that kings and queens have lost their heads, civil wars have been fought, and England has occasionally conquered the better part of France.