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Diana, meantime, has been at work on her public image, newly damaged by errant phone calls and Hewitt's tale. The Independent reported that press lord Rupert Murdoch, usually an antiroyalist, has had drinks with the princess at Kensington Palace. On a visit to Washington last weekend, Diana was guest of honor at a dinner given by Katharine Graham, owner of the Washington Post. She has made it clear that she has not encouraged any cooperation with Morton's forthcoming follow-up tell-all, Diana: Her New Life, which will appear next month. A pirated section of the book, published in a French magazine, projected the divorce settlement at more than $30 million.
Some of the issues that both the media and the public enjoy chewing on do not really amount to much. One has to do with Diana's title after divorce. Can she still be Princess of Wales? "It is all a matter of precedence and convention, and there is a good deal of flexibility," says Barker. Philip, vindictive toward her, supposedly wants her stripped of her title as a condition of divorce. Diana, ever the inspired one-upman, has let it be known that she might prefer the title to which she was born, Lady Diana Spencer. The Economist makes a suggestion sure to cause yelps at court: if people question whether Charles is fit to rule, then have a referendum on the subject. This recommendation is tied to a call for constitutional reform, and the Economist quotes Prince Philip's recent remark that a republic was "a perfectly reasonable alternative" to a constitutional monarchy.
Polls show that 75% of Britons support the continuation of the monarchy (down 10% from a decade ago). That is enough for the Windsors to work with if they can establish some decorum within their ranks. Auberon Waugh, always a mischiefmaker, thanked the royals in a recent edition of the Telegraph for "the diversion they bring into our humdrum lives as we follow their ups and downs, triumphs and disasters ... we can honestly say we love them all, each in a different way." He has a point. The appeal of this unscripted soap opera should not be ignored. But in the long run, the royals will lose out by counting on it.