Elizabeth the Queen
Read Elizabeth the Queen Online
Authors: Sally Bedell Smith
The Queen leaving the Belgian Embassy in London, 1963.
Reginald Davis MBE (London)
Copyright © 2012 by Sally Bedell Smith
All rights reserved.
Published in the United States by Random House, an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.
RANDOM HOUSE and colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Smith, Sally Bedell.
Elizabeth the Queen : inside the life of a modern monarch / Sally Bedell Smith.
p. cm.
eISBN: 978-0-679-64393-7
1. Elizabeth II, Queen of Great Britain, 1926– 2. Great Britain—History—Elizabeth II, 1952– 3. Queens—Great Britain—Biography. I. Title.
DA490.S55 2011
941.084092—dc23
[B]
2011023661
Front-jacket photograph: © Yousuf Karsh
Back-jacket photographs: © Hugo Burnand/AFP/Getty Images (top), © Tim Graham/Getty Images (bottom left), © Central Press/Getty Images (bottom right)
v3.1_r1
From “The Opening of Parliament,”
M
ARY
W
ILSON
,
wife of Harold Wilson,
Prime Minister, 1964–70 and 1974–76
They love her for her wisdom and her pride
,
Her friendship and her quiet majesty;
And soon the streets of Britain will be thronged
With crowds rejoicing in her Jubilee
But as the cool unfaltering voice reads on
,
A different picture forms upon the air—
A small quick figure, walking all alone
Across a glen studded with standing deer …
She notes a crumbling wall, an open gate
,
With countrywoman’s eyes she views the scene;
Yet, walking free upon her own estate
Still, in her solitude, she is the Queen
“She sort of expands when she laughs
.
She laughs with her whole face.”
Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh, in New Brunswick, Canada, during her Golden Jubilee celebrations, October 2002.
Norm Betts/Rex USA
CONTENTS
THIRTEEN
Iron Lady and English Rose
FOURTEEN
A Very Special Relationship
SEVENTEEN
Tragedy and Tradition
TWENTY-ONE
Long Live the Queen
PREFACE