God saved the Queen for 96 years, sending her victorious, happy, glorious, and all the rest, for as long as nearly all of us can remember. It’s a strange word, though: save. In the context of the national anthem, a song used in every British coronation since 1745, it means to keep the monarch alive and unharmed. We should note that the second verse – described at the Queen’s Golden Jubilee by the Prince of Wales as “non-politically-correct” – wishes the opposite upon Britain’s enemies. “Make them fall,” it exhorts. Monarchies are tribal things.
But save, of course, has another meaning: preserve, maintain, don’t throw away. Pop it in a box and keep for a rainy day, just in case. That kind of save. The one that goes with “scrimp and”. And it’s that saving – the post-war, tear the used stamp off an envelope, collect the tops off milk bottles, Green Shield stamps type of saving – that the Queen, despite her riches, seemed to embody. Somehow, despite the crowns and jewels, she connected us back to a less profligate time, of care and repair, of maintaining possessions, of being sensible and not over-reaching oneself. Of consistency. The Queen went to the same place every year for her holiday, used the same clothes designer over and over, always wore the same style Anello & Davide shoes (ten pairs on rotation, two new pairs a year), carried the same black bag. Her breakfast cereals – cornflakes, porridge oats – were kept in Tupperware containers. The material for her Norman Hartnell wedding dress was paid for in ration coupons. She reminded her increasingly, live-for-the-day public of a bygone era that required you to fold and re-use wrapping paper and pay the telly off on the tick. Much has been written about her sense of duty. But there was also a strong sense, common to all those who lived through the war, of waste not, want not.
Everything changes, the world moves on. But now that the Queen has passed away, the monarchy as we know it – tidier and social media-friendly but largely unchanged since the Victorian era – will shift. The reported “slimming down” of the royal family post-Elizabeth is necessary partly because several of the Queen’s relatives didn’t inherit her desire to keep at least some of the vast royal costs down.
If someone is around for as long as the Queen was, they become part of a familiar tradition, the regularly dusted everyday furniture of our lives. We have witnessed the Queen for as long as we can remember, seen her move from a young woman, in off-the-shoulder chiffon and diamond diadem for the Wilding pictures, to a smiling old lady in a decent tweed skirt. There is something very touching in that, as well as extremely patriarchal. No words, just a pretty smile: the Queen, despite her occasional speech references to an “annus horribilis”, did not talk with us, at least not in the way of her grandchildren, with their podcast appearances and Netflix deals.
She was born in an era where it was considered best for women to be quiet and make sure the household runs well. The new royal family will be louder. There’ll be more chat from now on, especially given that we’re unlikely to have a female head of state for many years: we’ll get Charles, then William, then George (though since 2013, if George says no, Charlotte will have to step up). We already know Charles’ opinions on so many things: monstrous carbuncles, homeopathy, asylum seekers and the fact that he believes his “entire life has been motivated so far by a desire to heal”. We saw the Queen, she saw us, but no one spoke, except in the politest of small talk. She was a relic from a time when the monarchy had to be read from a distance, like tea leaves, the subject of close interpretation, unspoken visual clues. We will come to miss it.
In the 1990s, for a column, I went to a Buckingham Palace garden party. I took a friend and we walked through the Palace (a bit shabby, to be honest) and out onto a perfectly lovely, wide green lawn, with a lake at the bottom and two marquees. One hosted a band playing versions of seminal British tunes (“I Vow to Thee My Country”; the James Bond theme); the other offered sandwiches (cucumber, meat paste), plus cake and a choice of tea or orange squash. When the Queen arrived, I stood on a chair to see her and was promptly told to get down. I went to the lake for a smoke, and then not knowing what to do with the dib end, I put it in my bag.
Anyway, we walked around the lake and came upon a summer house, one of those round, mostly glass affairs. We opened the door and looked in. It was stuffed with… stuff: a pair of African drums decorated with a small engraved plaque that announced them as a gift to the Queen from a foreign dignitary; dusty old summer chairs, stacked badly; small tables, also with commemorative plaques; what Bob Mortimer once referred to as “wicker shit”. It was like any garden shed, full of possessions that no one quite knows what to do with: unwanted gifts, summer furniture, stuff that might come in handy. The grandkids might like to play with that, you never know. It had better be saved.
I went back to those gardens recently, on a paid tour. I’d had a feeling I’d imagined the summer house, but it was there: clean and neat now, with furniture laid out as though the Queen and Princess Margaret were children, and they were about to have a Brownies meeting. There’s been a refurb, so the rooms in the palace are less shabby. You notice, though, that in some of the huge fireplaces, specifically the ones under the Canaletto paintings of Venice, there are high-end versions of the two-bar electric fire that British houses used to have, in the years before central heating. Not replaced or maintained. Saved.
When the Queen dies, what do we save? It is more than Elizabeth II that we have lost. That era of Windsors – the era of homemade sandwiches and hot flasks of tea with biscuits on a little plate – will disappear. Nearly a century of institutional memories: of war, of 15 Prime Ministers, of an empire dismantled. The Queen passes as perhaps the last great British institution – because she was the institution – so universally respected, even loved. In her absence, it feels like Britain itself is diminished. Not that anyone is going to rush in with Lulu Lytle wallpaper, but Buckingham Palace, now a set of royal offices with a National Trust house attached, will become even more of a heritage building, its nicer rooms hosting functions, but otherwise as redundant as any other stately home. Still grand, still bringing in the tourists, but its allure fading with the knowledge that the inside is a little more empty.
