THE WAR OF THE SPENCERS

IN SOUTH AFRICA, DIANA'S BROTHER FINDS HE CANNOT SHUT THE WORLD OUT FROM A SCANDAL OF HIS OWN

Charles Spencer should have been a Tudor. The members of that English royal dynasty, now extinct, excelled at passionate rhetoric, just like that provided by the earl in his unforgettable eulogy at the funeral of his sister Diana. The Tudors too were embroiled in endless marital controversies, though Spencer cannot end his with the finality available to Henry VIII--the thud of the headsman's ax. Still, one may wonder if Spencer was trying to display a similarly majestic, if less fatal, gesture--whether his righteous bombast against the media, delivered ostensibly to deify his sister, was not a self-interested attempt to raise himself...

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