The last question—could this be the last coronation?—is part of why I watched. What if it is? I’d have missed my only chance to see such a spectacle live, and I wasn’t having that!
As it happens, I enjoyed the spectacle, in all it anachronistic, gaudy, pretentiousness: It was fun. There are a lot of “WTF?” moments for me, including the “anointing with oil” part, which I thought was weird itself, but the BBC commentator dutifully told us that the King was then wearing a “super tunica” (or some such—I didn’t see it in print; also, our two free-to-air TV channels carried the BBC coverage live). A few moments later, we were informed that some people we could see onscreen were “The worshipful company of girdlers”. I quite literally laughed out loud.
As the coverage began to wind up, I made a comment on my personal Facebook that was what’s now my seldom-expressed, but honestly held opinion—in this case about the whole show:
I think the religious trappings are, at best, a throwback, a quaint, antique anachronism. Having said that, can the millennium-old ceremony even exist without overt promotion of the Anglican religion? If the UK Parliament dis-established the Anglican Church, how would that affect the monarchy? Would it, perhaps, end up making the modern monarchy MORE relevant?I’ve said many times (including last week, when I talked about watching the ceremony) how much I dislike overt religiosity, especially relating to only one religion, in any governmental function. The coronation, however, is not that: It’s an expressly religious anointing of the monarch as a servant of the Anglican god. The public functions were carried out immediately after the Queen died and Charles was proclaimed King—although the phrase “God save the King” was repeated over and over again, and the UK National Anthem asks that “God save our noble King”, so even in ostensibly secular settings religion is present.
Neither the monarchy, nor even democracy, are guaranteed. We, the people, choose what we have. We must chose carefully.
Those are actually mere quibbles. It’s a British thing, they can do what they want with it. Those of us who are secular can freely ignore and not participate in the expressly religious things. The issues are FAR bigger than that: What possible relevance does the coronation have in modern times? Much was made about how it’s been carried on for a thousand years, but that doesn’t mean it hasn’t changed, most notably when Henry VIII came along and dumped the Roman Catholic church, and the coronations then became Anglican services.
In the first couple days after the coronation, I saw a few people making a passionate defence of the monarchy, but the loudest commentary I encountered came from those appalled at the cost of the whole thing, and that UK taxpayers would be paying for much of it. When poverty has soared, and even middle class Britons are struggling, some felt it was unwise to spend so much money on a spectacle. The late Queen’s coronation was only a few years after the end of World War Two, when recovery—especially economic recovery—was still not done. Few would dispute, though, that Britons needed and welcomed the distraction. But now? I’m not sure.
Of course, that’s easy for me to say: New Zealand taxpayers paid very little for anything related to the coronation, and most of our money was spent to pay for New Zealand’s delegation attending the coronation, along with some minor things here in New Zealand, like gun salutes. NZ taxpayers got off very, very lightly compared to taxpayers in the UK.
Still, I was absolutely fascinated by the odd traditions and trappings (so many swords and staffs were used!), but I didn’t relate to it in any meaningful way. In fact, what I actually enjoyed the most was watching Queen Camilla: She often had a small, seemingly wry, smile on her face, as if she was thinking about how utterly absurd so much of the hoopla was. To me, she—and Prince William giving his father a kiss—were the most real and genuine moments. The rest? Interesting, but, for me, that’s about it.
I have no idea whether there’ll ever be another coronation (or maybe just in my lifetime), nor how long the monarchy will endure. For me, watching the coronation wasn’t about any of that, though the possibility that one or both might end during my lifetime gave me a particular determination to watch the coronation coverage. Life is so utterly unpredictable—in fact, at one point in the days before the event I was thinking how I could die before the coronation and miss it and the opportunity I was looking forward to. Fortunately, a premature exit was not to be my fate last week, so it now doesn’t matter if I ever see another coronation—I consider it checked off my “bucket list”.
As for all the other issues raised—about the monarchy itself, the cost, or even the worthiness of Charles and/or Camilla personally, everyone else can (and certainly will…) argue about all that. Someday, I may even join the discussion. However, for me, and at this particular time, the whole thing was only about the opportunity to watch an historic event for the first, and possibly last, time in my life. Others can do, say, or think whatever they want, obviously, but for me the opportunity to watch an historic event was—unapologetically—the whole point of it for me. Anyone who knows me also knows that I’ve had this same motivation repeatedly throughout my life, and, hopefully, I always will.
On Monday our time, I watched the Coronation Concert at Windsor Castle. I enjoyed it, I suppose—I’m always a bit indifferent about all such shows. And this was no different. But I was struck by something: The extent to which there was the attempt to humanise Charles—or maybe to reintroduce him to the rest of us. But that feeling started the day before the coronation.
On Friday evening, TVNZ’s TV One normally broadcasts the BBC progreamme, The Repair Shop, which I wrote about last December. A factoid that didn’t make it into the post was that King Charles appeared in an episode filmed in 2021, before the Queen died, and while Charles was still the Prince of Wales (the episode first aired in the UK in October of last year). I’ve never seen Charles look so, well, ordinary before. The point of the episode was to celebrate the BBC’s 100th Anniversary and to highlight training young people in sometimes ancient trades that are still needed (especially in a country with so many historic buildings and relics), and the skills shortages are growing. One of the then-prince’s projects was essentially a training school for those skills
In the episode, two treasures were brought to The Repair Shop, and one of the graduates from the then-Prince’s programme came there, too, to do some blacksmithing work. Also, clock repairer Steve Fletcher brought in his 21-year-old son, Fred, who is a clockmaker apprentice working for his dad (Steve, meanwhile, posted clips from the episode to his Instagram Stories). The then-prince then visited The Repair Shop to see the repaired/restored pieces, and first was shown the various craftspeople, and how they’re keeping the skills alive. Host Jav Blades touched the Prince a few times, which I—knowing that Charles is now King—was at first aghast at (no one ever touched the Queen). But, then, he wasn’t King at the time, and their interaction seemed quite natural and appropriate.
Similarly, during the concert, there were breaks where various people talked about some of the work that the King had done during his life, and included some “did you know” type things. Some of the things they highlighted didn’t necessarily know, and while nothing was memorable for me personally, it all kind of contributed to a quite different image of him than I had in my head, which was probably the point.
Add it all together, and I came away from the events with a feeling that Charles just might succeed in modernising and humanising the monarchy, probably in ways that his mother—the product of very, very different times—wouldn’t have been able to do. I guess we’ll all find out in time.
As for the larger issues that people seem to want to talk about, like republicanism, that’s too big a topic for this post. I merely wanted to reflect on what I experienced watching something I’d never seen before. But I’ll certainly return to those larger topics, because there definitely are things to talk about. However, since I entered the whole thing with one goal—to watch an historic event I may never see again—I got what I wanted out of it.
And no, I didn’t take part in “the people’s homage”. At least I’m consistent.
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