年轻的菲利普亲王
Posted: 2011-06-05 4:39
菲利普亲王下星期庆祝九十岁生日,今天Sunday Times上的一篇书评挺有意思。以前恍惚听说过菲利普亲王是欧洲王室的“穷亲戚”,没想到其童年生活如此颠沛流离。乔治六世夫妇居然答允身为第一继承人的女儿嫁给这位一文不名、脾气孤癖的军官,一见钟情的魔力不可低估啊
书评是Lynn Barber写的,即An Education的原作者。
Duke of Hazard
Lynn Barber
Given what a rackety childhood Prince Philip had, it’s astonishing that he hasn’t spent half his life in therapy. The eternal poor relation, penniless, homeless, effectively parentless, he was bundled from relative to relative, country to country, throughout his teens, and rarely knew in advance where he would be spending the school holidays. His mother was in an asylum, his father was drifting round the Riviera with his mistress; the nearest Philip had to a fixed address was his grandmother’s apartment at Kensington Palace, though he seldom stayed there.
Despite being Prince Philip of Greece, he had no Greek blood — it was just an accident of history that his Danish grandfather had been invited to become King of Greece.
Philip’s father, Prince Andrea, was the fourth son, so never likely to become king. He served as a cavalry officer in the Greek army but managed to be absent from most of the Turkish war. He is the Macavity of this story, mysteriously not there whenever important events were afoot.
Everyone thought Philip’s mother, Princess Alice of Battenberg, was mad to have married Andrea, but it was a love match at the beginning. She was a great beauty and, though deaf from birth, was so good at lip-reading that many people never suspected it. She had four daughters and then a long gap before finally producing the necessary son, Philip, on the dining-room table at Mon Repos, the family’s regency villa in Corfu, in 1921. But 18 months later, when Ataturk defeated the Greek army, Andrea was court-martialled, and banished into exile. The family fled to Paris, eventually settling in a villa in St Cloud.
The years at St Cloud were probably the most stable period of Philip’s childhood. He went to the American school where his best friends were the sons of the Chinese ambassador (did he call them “slitty eyes”?) and he learnt to play baseball before he learnt cricket. But then his mother started going mad. She had strange mood swings and religious fervour; she barely ate and took to lying on the floor in order to develop “the power conveyed to her from above”; she believed she was the bride of Christ but also “physically involved” with other religious leaders such as Buddha. She was sent to a psychoanalyst who asked his friend Sigmund Freud for advice. He recommended “an exposure of the gonads to X-rays in order to accelerate the menopause”. Apparently, this worked for a while, but then she became erratic again and in May 1930 she was sedated and bundled off to an asylum on Lake Constance. She had some contact with her son for the first two years then none at all for the next five.
Prince Andrea closed the house in St Cloud, went off to live with a mistress on the Riviera and — though never divorced — seldom saw his wife again. All four of Philip’s sisters quickly married German aristocrats, and Philip was sent to live with his maternal grandmother at Kensington Palace, and then with his uncle Georgie, the Marquess of Milford Haven, whose son David became his best friend.
Philip was basically living on charity and he learnt the habits of thrift, travelling by bus, and pressing his trousers under the mattress at night. But from time to time he would be summoned to great family events, weddings or funerals, where he would stay in grand palaces or schlosses with half the crowned heads (or deposed heads) of Europe. Then it was back to cold showers and meagre rations, first at Cheam then at Gordonstoun schools. By the time he left, in 1939, his mother had recovered and he spent his last school holiday staying with her in Athens, before going to Dartmouth Naval College as a cadet. The royal family visited Dartmouth while he was there, and he evidently made a great impression on the 13-year-old Princess Elizabeth.
Philip’s situation at the outbreak of war was extremely awkward. He was still “Prince Philip of Greece” and Greece was a neutral country; moreover, his sisters were in Germany, married to leading Nazis. His mother urged him to sit out the war with her in Athens, where she was going round dressed as a nun, setting up soup kitchens and orphanages, but Philip was eager to see action in the Royal Navy. “Uncle Dickie” Mountbatten pulled strings to keep him out of harm’s way, escorting troopships round Australia, India and South Africa, but when Greece joined the allies in 1940, Philip was able to join the Mediterranean fleet, and was mentioned in dispatches.
He was invited to spend Christmas 1943 at Windsor Castle and accepted because — as usual — he had “nowhere particular to go”. Princess Elizabeth was now 17, and her governess Crawfie reported that she was pink with excitement at the prospect of seeing him — she had already decided that Philip was “the one”. He watched her act in the royal pantomime, Aladdin, and spent several jolly evenings playing charades and dancing to the gramophone. He was invited to Windsor again in July, and Chips Channon was soon telling his diary: “I do believe that a marriage may well be arranged one day between Princess Elizabeth and Prince Philip of Greece.”
In many ways, Philip was a most unsuitable suitor. His only income was his naval pay of about £300 a year, and he barely seemed to own any clothes. He was not yet as irascible as he became later but, according to Harold Nicolson, the king and queen were initially unkeen because “they felt he was rough, ill mannered, uneducated and would probably not be faithful”. But he was gorgeously handsome and Princess Elizabeth was obviously in love. It was less obvious that he was, but then as a friend remarked, “Affection is not his natural currency.”
In March 1947, Philip renounced his Greek title and claim to the Greek throne and took British citizenship. In July his engagement to Princess Elizabeth was announced, to general public satisfaction. Their wedding, in November 1947, brought one of the biggest gatherings of royalty that century, though the Duke and Duchess of Windsor were not invited, nor were Philip’s German sisters. The early years of marriage seem to have been blissfully happy, and the princess enjoyed her new role as a naval wife. He had high hopes of soon being promoted to commander — but the early death of the king in 1952 meant that his naval career came to an abrupt end. The Queen seemed to make the transition easily, telling a friend, “I have lost all my timidity somehow”, but he went into a monumental sulk, complaining that he was being treated like an amoeba. Tales of his tetchiness and rudeness began to circulate, and Harold Macmillan noted: “I fear this young man is going to be as big a bore as Prince Albert and as great a trouble.”
I wonder if Prince Philip will appreciate what an invaluable 90th birthday present Philip Eade has given him by writing this book? It unveils no new sensations (Eade discusses the various women who were supposed to have been Philip’s girlfriends and concludes that none was serious), but by concentrating on the extreme oddity of his childhood, he makes the prince’s character more explicable and therefore more sympathetic. And, even though we know the ending, the narrative is as suspenseful as any thriller. Truly, an excellent read.
书评是Lynn Barber写的,即An Education的原作者。
Duke of Hazard
Lynn Barber
Given what a rackety childhood Prince Philip had, it’s astonishing that he hasn’t spent half his life in therapy. The eternal poor relation, penniless, homeless, effectively parentless, he was bundled from relative to relative, country to country, throughout his teens, and rarely knew in advance where he would be spending the school holidays. His mother was in an asylum, his father was drifting round the Riviera with his mistress; the nearest Philip had to a fixed address was his grandmother’s apartment at Kensington Palace, though he seldom stayed there.
Despite being Prince Philip of Greece, he had no Greek blood — it was just an accident of history that his Danish grandfather had been invited to become King of Greece.
Philip’s father, Prince Andrea, was the fourth son, so never likely to become king. He served as a cavalry officer in the Greek army but managed to be absent from most of the Turkish war. He is the Macavity of this story, mysteriously not there whenever important events were afoot.
Everyone thought Philip’s mother, Princess Alice of Battenberg, was mad to have married Andrea, but it was a love match at the beginning. She was a great beauty and, though deaf from birth, was so good at lip-reading that many people never suspected it. She had four daughters and then a long gap before finally producing the necessary son, Philip, on the dining-room table at Mon Repos, the family’s regency villa in Corfu, in 1921. But 18 months later, when Ataturk defeated the Greek army, Andrea was court-martialled, and banished into exile. The family fled to Paris, eventually settling in a villa in St Cloud.
The years at St Cloud were probably the most stable period of Philip’s childhood. He went to the American school where his best friends were the sons of the Chinese ambassador (did he call them “slitty eyes”?) and he learnt to play baseball before he learnt cricket. But then his mother started going mad. She had strange mood swings and religious fervour; she barely ate and took to lying on the floor in order to develop “the power conveyed to her from above”; she believed she was the bride of Christ but also “physically involved” with other religious leaders such as Buddha. She was sent to a psychoanalyst who asked his friend Sigmund Freud for advice. He recommended “an exposure of the gonads to X-rays in order to accelerate the menopause”. Apparently, this worked for a while, but then she became erratic again and in May 1930 she was sedated and bundled off to an asylum on Lake Constance. She had some contact with her son for the first two years then none at all for the next five.
Prince Andrea closed the house in St Cloud, went off to live with a mistress on the Riviera and — though never divorced — seldom saw his wife again. All four of Philip’s sisters quickly married German aristocrats, and Philip was sent to live with his maternal grandmother at Kensington Palace, and then with his uncle Georgie, the Marquess of Milford Haven, whose son David became his best friend.
Philip was basically living on charity and he learnt the habits of thrift, travelling by bus, and pressing his trousers under the mattress at night. But from time to time he would be summoned to great family events, weddings or funerals, where he would stay in grand palaces or schlosses with half the crowned heads (or deposed heads) of Europe. Then it was back to cold showers and meagre rations, first at Cheam then at Gordonstoun schools. By the time he left, in 1939, his mother had recovered and he spent his last school holiday staying with her in Athens, before going to Dartmouth Naval College as a cadet. The royal family visited Dartmouth while he was there, and he evidently made a great impression on the 13-year-old Princess Elizabeth.
Philip’s situation at the outbreak of war was extremely awkward. He was still “Prince Philip of Greece” and Greece was a neutral country; moreover, his sisters were in Germany, married to leading Nazis. His mother urged him to sit out the war with her in Athens, where she was going round dressed as a nun, setting up soup kitchens and orphanages, but Philip was eager to see action in the Royal Navy. “Uncle Dickie” Mountbatten pulled strings to keep him out of harm’s way, escorting troopships round Australia, India and South Africa, but when Greece joined the allies in 1940, Philip was able to join the Mediterranean fleet, and was mentioned in dispatches.
He was invited to spend Christmas 1943 at Windsor Castle and accepted because — as usual — he had “nowhere particular to go”. Princess Elizabeth was now 17, and her governess Crawfie reported that she was pink with excitement at the prospect of seeing him — she had already decided that Philip was “the one”. He watched her act in the royal pantomime, Aladdin, and spent several jolly evenings playing charades and dancing to the gramophone. He was invited to Windsor again in July, and Chips Channon was soon telling his diary: “I do believe that a marriage may well be arranged one day between Princess Elizabeth and Prince Philip of Greece.”
In many ways, Philip was a most unsuitable suitor. His only income was his naval pay of about £300 a year, and he barely seemed to own any clothes. He was not yet as irascible as he became later but, according to Harold Nicolson, the king and queen were initially unkeen because “they felt he was rough, ill mannered, uneducated and would probably not be faithful”. But he was gorgeously handsome and Princess Elizabeth was obviously in love. It was less obvious that he was, but then as a friend remarked, “Affection is not his natural currency.”
In March 1947, Philip renounced his Greek title and claim to the Greek throne and took British citizenship. In July his engagement to Princess Elizabeth was announced, to general public satisfaction. Their wedding, in November 1947, brought one of the biggest gatherings of royalty that century, though the Duke and Duchess of Windsor were not invited, nor were Philip’s German sisters. The early years of marriage seem to have been blissfully happy, and the princess enjoyed her new role as a naval wife. He had high hopes of soon being promoted to commander — but the early death of the king in 1952 meant that his naval career came to an abrupt end. The Queen seemed to make the transition easily, telling a friend, “I have lost all my timidity somehow”, but he went into a monumental sulk, complaining that he was being treated like an amoeba. Tales of his tetchiness and rudeness began to circulate, and Harold Macmillan noted: “I fear this young man is going to be as big a bore as Prince Albert and as great a trouble.”
I wonder if Prince Philip will appreciate what an invaluable 90th birthday present Philip Eade has given him by writing this book? It unveils no new sensations (Eade discusses the various women who were supposed to have been Philip’s girlfriends and concludes that none was serious), but by concentrating on the extreme oddity of his childhood, he makes the prince’s character more explicable and therefore more sympathetic. And, even though we know the ending, the narrative is as suspenseful as any thriller. Truly, an excellent read.