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Princess Diana and Prince Harry, left, and Prince William in London in 1995.Credit :
Antony Jones/Julian Parker/UK Press via Getty
Princess Diana was the “biggest changemaker” when it came to the royal family.
Diana, who died in 1997, had a far-reaching effect on the monarchy she married into when she wed the future King Charles 45 years ago on July 29, 1981.
The new biography The Four Wives of Windsor examines how a group of women who married into the royal family — Princess Diana, Kate Middleton, Meghan Markle and Queen Camilla — have changed it through their different approaches.
Author Simon Vigar tells PEOPLE, “Diana had a sense of destiny about her. The only aristocrat of the four women, she knew a lot about it. She grew up [at Park House] on the Sandringham estate and knew the royals, and her big sister went out with Charles.”
“But she is the biggest changemaker,” he adds.
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Mainly, Vigar says, that came through her tactile manner with the public and in how her sons, Prince William, now 44, and Prince Harry, now 41, were raised.
“Even simply going to Tower Records on Kensington High Street was something you couldn’t imagine the previous generation doing,” Vigar says on Diana’s way of bringing them up as normally as possible in extraordinary circumstances. “She made the royal family more relatable and more touchy-feely.”
The effect she had was seismic. “Subjectively, she brought star power,” says Vigar, who has reported on the royals at the U.K.’s Channel 5 for about two decades. He says a source who worked at Kensington Palace then said the royal family “didn’t really know what they had under their noses with Diana. She never had a full-time press officer — she didn’t need one. The royals say they want to change, but it is only when it suits them. Of course, Diana outshone them in the end.”
Vigar adds, “And then there was the choice of school for her sons. Going to Eton College was very much a Diana decision. Her brother and father went there, and of course, it was much closer to home than Gordonstoun, where Charles wasn’t happy anyway.”
That has influenced Prince William and Princess Kate’s choice of school for their eldest son, Prince George, who starts at Eton in September.
“William had had a good time there. It ticked so many boxes for William and Catherine,” Vigar tells PEOPLE. “In the age of the smartphone, it is probably better to be at an all-boys school rather than a co-ed one.”
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When Diana died, she even changed how the royals, and the wider public, grieve in public. “There is a daily physical reminder of Diana because of the Union Flag over Buckingham Palace which only exists now because of what happened in the week after her death,” Vigar says. “I call it Diana’s flag because without all that anger and shock and distress, that Union Jack wouldn’t be there today.”
In September 1997, Queen Elizabeth had refused to change the protocol of having a flag there when the monarch was not in residence — and therefore fly it at half-staff. That was, until after massive public pressure to show a sign the royals cared, the Queen changed her mind on the eve of the funeral.
“It is only there now in case someone important dies,” the author says. “The Queen wouldn’t budge on that all week because it was protocol not to have a flag on that if she wasn’t there. Even she changed her tune.”
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The impact Princess Kate has made is also analyzed by Vigar. Her family, headed by her parents Carole and Michael, has been instrumental and now has a key role in helping raise the next generation of royals, including 13-year-old George, who is destined to be king someday.
“[Queen] Elizabeth realized pretty early on about what a good thing she was and the Middleton family were the backbone,” Vigar says. “William really loved going to [Kate’s hometown] Bucklebury for an ordinary Sunday roast lunch.”
“You can see it in the childhood that George, Charlotte and Louis are having now. It is mostly private apart from moments like appearances at Trooping the Colour and the annual carol service,” he adds.
“The royal family learned the lessons of Diana [who only had months from meeting Charles to marriage] in that she was given a really long time to decide whether she wanted to buy into it,” the author says. “Catherine is no wallflower. She has her own ideas. Behind the scenes, she asks really good questions. The royal family doesn’t think of themselves as a brand, but they are, and a source told me she got that straight away.”
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He adds that Kate and William, along with Prince Harry and Meghan Markle, are couples “who were in love in a way that Charles and Diana were not.”
Diana was 20 when she walked down the aisle with Charles in 1981. She died in Paris in 1997, at age 36. “Meghan was a divorcee too,” Vigar says. “When Meghan married Harry in 2018, she was older than Diana was when she died. There were different expectations. Meghan expected total PR control, which was not possible in the British royal family.”
He adds of Meghan: “She was obviously a massive asset,” adding on the couple’s first outing in Nottingham in 2017, “She was brilliant with the crowd, with the people. She would have been a major player in the royal family, and it is a crying shame that she’s not.”
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Vigar adds, “The Grenfell kitchen book [to help victims of an apartment block fire disaster] was a small example. She ran with it privately and got it done. You could see what a doer she is, and to me it is such a shame that it’s gone to waste. She should have been, could have been, fantastic for the royal family, but egos on both sides got in the way. By 2019, nobody was talking to each other. Harry and Meghan seemed to be on a path where they felt alone. They should have been transformative.”
