Two weekends ago, the Daily Mail published some excerpts from Catherine Mayer’s new book, Divide & Rule. Mayer examines the roles of the Windsors’ married-in women, some of whom thrive under what are basically feudal marriage arrangements versus women who were broken by the royal system, and the one woman who escaped with her life, her husband and her children. Judging solely from the excerpts, Mayer gives the current Princess of Wales a huge amount of grace and praise. Mayer rarely extends the same grace to the Duchess of Sussex, but Mayer at least tried to show some limited sympathy for Meghan. Mayer wrote about the long-standing rumors that Kate changed universities to throw herself in Prince William’s path, and Mayer also examines Kate’s pre-Meghan image problems, that Kate was often tagged as being “boring, drab and workshy.” Well, Mayer also suggests that Kate is something of an ice queen behind the scenes.

The Princess of Wales has a picture-perfect image in public – and it’s easy to see why she’s so adored. Kate, 44, has maintained her popular “girl-next-door” image for many years, according to Catherine Mayer, author of new book, Divide & Rule, published on 20 June. But behind the scenes, she is a “woman of considerable power and control” and controls her own image.

Writing in the Daily Mail, the biographer claims: “Behind the girl-next-door image is a woman of considerable power and control, who has played the royal game more adroitly than most. Google Kate’s names (any of them) and results come back studded with the same trio of adjectives: ‘beautiful’, ‘radiant’, ‘perfect’. To her biographer, Robert Jobson, she exemplifies ‘the quintessential image of a picture-perfect princess’.”

She adds: “In public, she is unfailingly cheerful, managing to give the impression, even at the most mundane royal engagement, that there is nowhere she would rather be. But in private, she is reportedly capable of a coolness that sometimes chills.”

[From Hello]

My opinion of Kate has evolved over time, which I’m sure is true for most people. I think Kate once had a spark, a slightly more gregarious personality, a flawed humanity which made her compelling. But over time, the institution – and the sorry state of her marriage – has made Kate into a different person. Colder, absolutely. Almost robot-like, like a doll with tricky wiring. Maybe the “coolness” has always been there though. There were always stories about Kate at university and beyond, and how she cleared off as many other girls and women as she could. The way she treated Meghan was, in my opinion, just the tip of the iceberg.

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Cover Images.