An old joke says that in hell the organizers are Germans; the mechanics, French; the lovers, Swiss; the bankers, Italians, and the cooks, English. But in heaven the Swiss are the bankers, the French are the cooks, the Italians are the lovers, the Germans are the mechanics, and the English are the organizers. No one rides a tail as well as an Englishman.
The kingdom’s chief organizer is Edward Fitzalan-Howard, a 65-year-old man, Eddie to his friends, father of five, Oxford-educated, Catholic, recently divorced from a woman he was married to for three and a half decades, passionate car racer, who made his fortune with a bottled gas company. His work consists of organizing the funerals and coronations of the English monarchs, he was responsible for the farewell to Queen Elizabeth II, and he is in charge of the great party to celebrate the accession to the throne of Carlos III.
But this is not a position for which you advertise in the newspapers or do job interviews. It is hereditary and corresponds to the highest-ranking Duke in Great Britain, which is that of Norfolk, based at Arundel Castle, in the county of West Sussex. His father passed it on to him, and before that his grandfather had passed it on to his father. It is one of those traditions that are valued so much in the United Kingdom, and that make the country a little different from the others.
The responsibility is enormous, because the eyes of the world are pending the events that it organizes, but let’s say that it does not involve exhausting hours, weekends at the foot of the canyon or emergency calls in the middle of the night. The last coronation that was held was that of Elizabeth II, in 1953 (70 years ago), and the longevity of the Windsors means that state funerals are not exactly abundant either. There is no talk of salary, but the Duke of Norfolk, with a fortune of 120 million euros, does not need to be paid.
The coronation of Carlos III hopes that it will go as well as the funeral of Isabel II. Time to prepare it has not been lacking. He has been at it for 20 years together with a small group of a couple dozen collaborators, with whom he meets … once a year at Buckingham Palace to review the protocol. Now more frequently, as the occasion approaches, but without losing sleep.
The new monarch has expressed the wish (and his wishes often come true) for a ceremony “adapted to the times”, less pompous than his mother’s coronation, with a smaller procession, from Buckingham to Westminster Abbey and back . Camila will wear Queen Mary’s crown instead of the much more ostentatious Koh-i-Noor, which has colonial implications and is claimed by Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan and India.
The big headache in Eddie’s preparations is everything related to Enrique and Meghan, the Dukes of Sussex, whether or not they will come from California, and what role to give them in the coronation taking into account, on the one hand, their rank and , on the other, the terrible state of his relations with the family after the explosive statements in books and press and television interviews, including accusations of racism and discrimination. Will they be invited to appear on the balcony and say hello? Where will they sit in the abbey? The palace has recognized that his children, little Archie and Lilibet, are de facto princes from the moment Carlos became king. There is no need to add fuel to the fire.
The weekend of May 6 will have an additional holiday (Monday, what the country’s productivity index and an economy on the verge of recession lacked), there will be a concert of laser lights that will be projected on the castle In Windsor, pubs will stay open an extra two hours at night, and subjects have been encouraged to organize potlucks, picnics, and street snacks.
More than 4,000 million people followed Isabel’s funeral on television, which was organized by Edward Fitzalan-Howard. Carlos’s coronation audience won’t reach that figure, but it will also be a great thing, and he doesn’t want to fail. Still, there’s no danger of getting fired.
