The Death of Queen Elizabeth II
While Britain’s self-conception was politically shattered by Brexit, the death of Queen Elizabeth II was — it felt to some — the symbolic end of internationalist Britain, of benevolent Britain.
Some long way down South Carriage Drive from the state funeral itself, the Queen’s mourners at the Albert Memorial were not of the fervent type. They, like me, had not queued along the Thames to see her lying in state, and were dressed mostly in a sort of office-casual. The late Queen had been a constant in the life of everyone lining that road. So they came, to see for a few seconds a black car bearing her body pass them by; nearly a century in a blip. A simmering anticipation swelled and broke, the passing and the long life that preceded it applauded, the questioning of what next not quite beginning.
While Britain’s self-conception was politically shattered by Brexit, the death of Queen Elizabeth II was — it felt to many — the symbolic end of internationalist Britain, of benevolent Britain.
Some long way down South Carriage Drive from the state funeral itself, mourners of Queen Elizabeth II at the Albert Memorial were not of the fervent type. They, like me, had not queued along the Thames to see her lying in state, and were dressed mostly in a sort of office-casual. The late Queen had been a constant in the life of everyone lining that road. So they came, to see for a few seconds a black car bearing her body pass them by; nearly a century in a blip. A simmering anticipation swelled and broke, the passing and the long life that preceded it applauded, the questioning of what next not quite beginning.
I was in Marrakech when the Queen died, at her summer residence in Scotland in September 2022. When I landed in London the next day, a sense of dizzying change was in effect. A long drought had broken, returning parched fields to a dizzying green, and the country’s most incompetent and shortest-serving Prime Minister, Liz Truss, had entered power.
In the days that followed, the Queen’s body returned to Westminster Hall, from where queues to witness her lying-in-state stretched 10 miles along the Thames to Southwark Park. Meanwhile, 500 heads of state and foreign dignitaries flocked to London to attend the state funeral. There, the Prime Minister was misidentified on Australian television as an anonymous ‘minor royal’. The short-lived chaos of her premiership was everything the Queen had not been. Staid, stoical; respectful and respected; quiet, tactful.
I was in Marrakech when the Queen died, at her summer residence in Scotland in September 2022. When I landed in London the next day, a sense of dizzying change was in effect. A long drought had broken, returning parched fields to a dizzying green, and the country’s most incompetent and shortest-serving Prime Minister, Liz Truss, had entered power.
In the days that followed, the Queen’s body returned to Westminster Hall, from where queues to witness her lying-in-state stretched 10 miles along the Thames to Southwark Park. Meanwhile, 500 heads of state and foreign dignitaries flocked to London to attend the state funeral. There, the Prime Minister was misidentified on Australian television as an anonymous ‘minor royal’. The short-lived chaos of her premiership was everything the Queen had not been. Staid, stoical; respectful and respected; quiet, tactful.
It is a great anachronism this royal family. Towards the end of her life, it had already lost its grip on much of the national nostalgia complex; its internal politics beginning to look more and more like the scandal-stricken politics of the country. Association with sex-offenders, abuses of power, thinly veiled racism, bullying, resignations, in-fighting, PR-warring.
Somehow, all this made the figure of the Queen an ever more dependable, ever more symbolic presence. No matter the collision of mass media on this fabled — and inherently private — institution, no matter the incursion of chaos onto a historically mature body-politic, the Queen was an indefinable ur-point to an ideal Britishness; a centre around which little had seemed to hold. She had outlasted war in Europe, the collapse of the British Empire, the building of a modern state and its ‘Commonwealth’; post-industrialisation, neoliberalism, mass-media, global pandemic, and Trump — so we hoped.
It is a great anachronism this royal family. Towards the end of her life, it had already lost its grip on much of the national nostalgia complex; its internal politics beginning to look more and more like the scandal-stricken politics of the country. Association with sex-offenders, abuses of power, thinly veiled racism, bullying, resignations, in-fighting, PR-warring.
Somehow, all this made the figure of the Queen an ever more dependable, ever more symbolic presence. No matter the collision of mass media on this fabled — and inherently private — institution, no matter the incursion of chaos onto a historically mature body-politic, the Queen was an indefinable ur-point to an ideal Britishness; a centre around which little had seemed to hold. She had outlasted war in Europe, the collapse of the British Empire, the building of a modern state and its ‘Commonwealth’; post-industrialisation, neoliberalism, mass-media, global pandemic, and Trump — so we hoped.
She held a central role in the national story of post-war Britain. One truly impossible to replace. And, some years on, Britain, and the world, is a changed place. War in Europe is back; Trump is back. The climate crisis is destabilising the nations Britain once ruled over. In all this, the Queen’s dependable presence, her ability to conjure modern Britain’s origin story – forged from war – is no longer.
But nostalgia is rarely a helpful emotion, and as a new cautious realism and a rising far-right take hold in British politics, its absence both promises and threatens.
She held a central role in the national story of post-war Britain. One truly impossible to replace. And, some years on, Britain, and the world, is a changed place. War in Europe is back; Trump is back. The climate crisis is destabilising the nations Britain once ruled over. In all this, the Queen’s dependable presence, her ability to conjure modern Britain’s origin story – forged from war – is no longer.
But nostalgia is rarely a helpful emotion, and as a new cautious realism and a rising far-right take hold in British politics, its absence both promises and threatens.