The following column is the opinion and analysis of the writer:
When Queen Elizabeth died I felt conflicted.
A BBC-tutored Anglophile with a superficial grasp of the history of the British Monarchy, from the Tudors to Diana, this fan of “The Crown” felt the loss of one of history’s giant figures.
Yet I was perplexed by the depth of American grief over the loss of a British tabloid celebrity. The Irish rebel in me cracked an insensitive joke or two.
And then, faith ’n’begorrah, I scrolled into the Twitter lands of the Irish, out of dark curiosity, and came upon this reprinted “Irish Times” excerpt from a column by Patrick Freyne:
“Having a monarchy next door is a little like having a neighbor who’s really into clowns and has daubed their house with clown murals, displays clown dolls in each window and has an insatiable desire to hear about and discuss clown-related news stories, More specifically, for the Irish, it’s like having a neighbor who’s really into clowns and, also, your grandfather was murdered by a clown.”
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Descended from Irish refugees who fled vile oppression at the hands of the Irish-hating British in the 19th century, how could I not feel a conflicted reaction to the Queen’s death?
But this? Jesus, Mary an’ Joseph.
Back in the eighties, friends and I attended a performance of the Royal Military Tattoo here in Tucson and were heckled by Irish-American protestors sympathetic to the Irish Republican Army. One shouted “traitor” at this Irish-American for patronizing a performance of pipes and drums by the pride of her Majesty, the unforgiven Monarch.
Visiting Ireland in 2012 I met many souls who recalled tales of British brutality, nurtured and curated and passed down across the mists of centuries, unforgiving heirlooms of bitter loathing.
Before you condemn this unforgiving spirit or wag your fingers and wail “Too soon!” at the Irish Times, how can we expect others to forgive and forget their history when we do not forgive and forget our own? I have lived in corners of our American South where mention of Abraham Lincoln can still make heads turn and lips sneer.
Today, are not too many of us longing not to seek forgiveness—but simply to forget and wash away our own shameful histories of slavery, genocide and colonialism?
Which is why Queen Elizabeth’s gesture of reconciliation with Ireland mutes my conflicting reactions to her passing. In 2011, Queen Elizabeth II laid a wreath at a Memorial Garden in Dublin and spoke of reconciliation, a lovely word.
Could I forget that generations past, the British exported food from the Emerald Isle during the murderous famine that starved 1 million men, women and children to death? I could not.
Neither could she. “To all those who have suffered as a consequence of our troubled past, I extend my sincere thoughts and deep sympathy; With the benefit of historical hindsight, we can all see things which we would wish had been done differently or not at all.”
May the roads rise up to meet the late Queen for visiting Ireland and speaking reconciliation. May the wind be always at her back for what she did the following year when she shook the hand of no ordinary deputy First Minister of Northern Ireland, a former Commander of the Irish Republican Army, the militia responsible for the murder of her beloved cousin, Lord Mountbatten, a man she affectionately called “Dickie,” a relative whose murder had been described brutally by the IRA as an “execution.”
May the sun shine warm upon the face of she who forgave and shook the bloody hand. May the rains fall soft on the fields of she who said, “We can all see things which we would wish had been done differently or not at all.
Still, as the descendant of American revolutionaries who fought against the Royal family’s armies in our War of Independence, I am conflicted. You are someone else’s Royal Highness. Forgive me, mum, but this Yank believes monarchs are absurd. Save, of course, for Elvis, the King.
I confess when Tom, the young Irish socialist found employment at “Downton Abbey” as their chauffeur, I had hoped he would slay the entire family of annoying fictional twits in their sleep. In the first season. Instead, he tells a village school teacher he meets at a political rally, that he had come to feel “I do not believe in types, but in people.” Unlike that Irishman, I am not conflicted about the humbug of aristocracy. Yet we can choose to believe in people.
And I can agree with John, Paul, Ringo and George, those Brits from Liverpool, that “Her Majesty is a pretty nice girl.” Sláinte, Elizabeth. May God hold you in the hollow of his hand. And may we never forget and always strive to forgive.
