The longest and oldest-reigning monarch of Britain has left to meet her makers. The good Elizabeth Windsor’s legacy will remain unmatched, by her less-Victorian sounding Charles III whose comportment smacks less of a British monarch than the son of a queen. Queen Elizabeth II saw 15 prime ministers come into office. She is the single-handed witness of the decline and the (domestically constrained) resurgence of the British state. She rejoiced in the country’s glory, lived through the bad and the ugly, in a terrifyingly modern, saga-ridden era by her standards. In the wealth of experience she’d acquired through the years, from the age of twenty-five to a majestic ninety-six, she stands next to Edward VIII.
The 20th century was a period of social and economic upheaval. So much had undergone a sea change during the second Elizabethan era that to most, she embodies the dragon-like Britain herself. The calmness of her comportment, and the stoicism of her outlook, and a manner that speaks of “doing more, talking less”, hers will be a tough act for her successor to emulate. Yet as history has shown, every monarch who has ever worn the crown, never lived up to the ideals of their vaunted predecessors. Instead, they carved their own monarchical identities, clouted in prestige, and shaped the country’s ways along its contours.
Charles III may not be able to knit the commonwealth as the Queen had done, remaining accountable in an age that did not warrant accountability, that had shed the last vestiges of the empire life, but had sworn its names to liberty and democracy. If ever someone held the commonwealth in high esteem, it was the Queen. The commonwealth, a voluntary grouping of former British dependencies and colonies, is set to expand, encompassing one-thirds of the world’s population, and has become an academic praxis for defining types of work, the most common being that of “commonwealth literature” (sadly, to Rushdie’s disgust). Gabon and Togo have been welcomed, and more is in the offing. But these young countries will miss their thoughtful leader. She epitomised the best of British qualities, the Britishness which they had inherited in their systems and law books.
As the Queen is put to rest on September 19th, she will be mourned for not just within the United Kingdom, but the world over. Even the self-proclaimed emerging powers of the likes of India will find it hard to shrug off her legacy.
The Unsaturated Reader 