James Owen - The Times Queen Elizabeth II: Her 70 Year Reign

Max Mumby/Indigo

by James Owen

There are few other presences in most peoples lives as constant as the Queen. Britains longest-reigning monarch has been our sovereign for 70 years and famous for almost 100. She is as much a part of our culture as red post boxes, as familiar as cloudy skies and as reassuring as tea and toast. And yet, what do we really know about her?

A century ago, when she was born, such a question would not have been asked. The press, like everyone else, knew their place. That of the royal family was at the top of society, indeed at the top of a world in which Britain, with an empire covering a quarter of the globe, was still the dominant power.

With ever-gathering speed, that world has changed forever during Elizabeths reign. She has been at the centre of extraordinary events, not least in her own family, for decade after decade. And yet, she has weathered them.

More than most, she has had to adapt herself to a different way of doing things. The outer splendour of her life may have appeared to remain much the same, but during her years on the throne the monarchy has had to renegotiate its relationship with its subjects. It has had to accept far greater scrutiny of its privileges and much more curiosity about the behaviour of those who enjoy them.

The Queen, however, with very few exceptions, has never lost her standing with her people; it is impossible to think of her, unlike Queen Victoria, being booed in public. Always on show, never saying anything controversial indeed hardly anything truly memorable she has allowed few glimpses of what she actually thinks or feels.

She is simply there, and we are rightly grateful for her decades of unstinting service and for the stability she provides. But she is an enigma.

As we celebrate her Platinum Jubilee, as what were key moments in both her life and ours turn from news into history, this volume both preserves her remarkable achievements and seeks to understand how she came to accomplish them.

If the photographs provide a comprehensive record of her public life, the selection of short essays by writers at The Times and by leading royal historians, interspersed with contemporary news reports on turning points in her life, offer a series of perspectives on the less visible Queen the private experiences and inner qualities that have shaped her and her reign.

Her path to the throne was extraordinary just in itself. When she was born, in 1926, there was no expectation that she would become Queen, as her father, then the Duke of York, was the younger brother of the heir, the future King Edward VIII. With her uncles abdication in 1936, her world, and that of her parents and her sister, Princess Margaret, was turned upside down.

Like ordinary Britons, she endured the war years, served in the armed forces as a driver, and even escaped briefly from Buckingham Palace to take part in the jubilation of VE Day. Her choice of a husband was similarly bold, for Prince Philip was, by royal standards, an outsider, a foreigner, a refugee even, with few prospects and a maverick, modernising streak.

Nevertheless, he gave her the support she needed when she succeeded to the throne at 25, in 1952, and provided much of the impetus for the changes needed to fit the institution of monarchy to a new world. The essays detail the Queens relationships with the prime ministers who have served her, beginning with Winston Churchill, her influence on diplomatic relations with countries such as America, and her dedicated leadership of a Commonwealth which now encompasses 54 different nations.

What has sustained her all these years, beyond her profound sense of duty, are her enthusiasms, notably horse racing and her beloved dogs, her homes, and her family her parents, her children and now the grandchildren and great-grandchildren who will follow her.

Together with her shrewd choice of advisers, they have enabled her in the last 20 years to transform faster than ever the shape of the monarchy, recognising the public discontent that met the official reaction to the death of Diana, Princess of Wales, and rebuilding, too, from the ashes of the fire-ravaged Windsor Castle.

For all the pageantry and ceremony with which we associate the Queen in her public role, what has underpinned this is her personal modesty, the sense that she has never taken things for granted. We have been very fortunate to have her all these years. Long may she yet reign happy and glorious!