King Charles Breaks Silence by Having Another Man Write Letter Confirming Absolutely Nothing Has Changed
British newspapers declare constitutional earthquake after Palace successfully locates paperwork from 2020
Britain was plunged into a constitutional crisis this week after King Charles III dramatically “broke his silence” on Prince Harry and Meghan Markle by apparently remaining completely silent while the Lord Chamberlain sent a letter.
The extraordinary development was reported breathlessly by Page Six as a “new blow” to the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, despite the substance of the announcement being that their status has not changed.
For anyone unfamiliar with modern royal journalism, “breaking his silence” is a technical industry term meaning somebody associated with Buckingham Palace caused words to exist somewhere.
Charles did not appear on television.
He did not summon Harry to the throne room.
He did not gallop through Hyde Park shouting, “THE SUSSEXES SHALL NOT PASS!”
Instead, Lord Chamberlain Lord Benyon circulated guidance explaining that Harry and Meghan remain non-working members of the Royal Family, their HRH styles remain in abeyance, their charitable activities are private, their office remains separate from the Royal Household and security questions remain matters for the relevant authorities.
In other words, Britain has received the constitutional equivalent of an email saying:
No changes since our previous correspondence.
Naturally, newspapers treated this like the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand.
Palace Announces Historic Continuation of Existing Situation
The King reportedly authorized the communication to prevent “doubt or confusion” concerning Harry and Meghan’s status.
This was an admirable objective and also possibly the first time Buckingham Palace has attempted a project fundamentally incompatible with British newspapers.
Removing doubt and confusion from royal coverage would be like removing hops from beer.
There would be nothing left but the bottle.
The Sussexes returned to Britain in late August after six years primarily based in North America. Their children, Archie and Lilibet, were expected to attend school in Britain, while reports consistently said Harry and Meghan were not returning as working royals.
Then this week arrived.
The Palace confirmed that the thing everybody had been told remained the thing everybody had been told.
Royal correspondent trucks reportedly screeched into position.
Editors cracked their knuckles.
Television producers located archival footage of Buckingham Palace gates opening.
Somewhere, a graphic designer typed “ROYAL BOMBSHELL” over a photograph of Harry looking mildly concerned at an airport in 2019.
This is the beautiful ecosystem of British royal journalism.
Nothing enters.
Nothing leaves.
But enormous quantities of heat are produced.
King Charles Deploys Britain’s Most Powerful Weapon: Administrative Clarification
According to reporting from ITV News, the letter went to government officials, military offices and lord lieutenants across Britain.
That was probably sensible administratively.
Comedically, however, it suggests Britain had become dangerously close to chaos.
Imagine the confusion otherwise.
A lord lieutenant in Shropshire sees Meghan at Waitrose.
“Good God, is she working?”
Nobody knows.
The RAF scrambles two Typhoons.
A council closes the A49.
The Archbishop of Canterbury is pulled from lunch.
Someone telephones Windsor.
“Sir, the Duchess has purchased avocados.”
“PERSONAL OR OFFICIAL?”
“We don’t know.”
“My God.”
Now, thankfully, Britain has procedures.
If Meghan attends a charity lunch, everybody can consult the royal memo before accidentally firing a 21-gun salute.
Newspapers Discover Private Citizens Sell Newspapers
The funniest element remains the insistence that Harry and Meghan are private citizens.
Private citizens generally do not require clarification letters from monarchs circulated among senior military officials.
Nobody has ever written:
KING CLARIFIES DEREK FROM LEEDS REMAINS PRIVATE CITIZEN AFTER RETURN FROM TENERIFE
Yet Harry and Meghan possess that magical royal form of privacy in which millions of people are repeatedly informed that they are private.
The press spent much of the past six years demanding that the Sussexes stop behaving like royals.
Now the Palace has formally reiterated that they are not working royals.
And the response has been:
HOW DARE THEY BE SO INTERESTING WHILE NOT BEING ROYAL?
The arrangement presents newspapers with a terrible business problem.
If Harry and Meghan are working royals, write about them.
If Harry and Meghan aren’t working royals, write about why they aren’t working royals.
If they live in California, ask why they abandoned Britain.
If they move back to Britain, ask why they’ve come back.
If Harry seeks reconciliation, he is desperate.
If Harry doesn’t seek reconciliation, he is cruel.
If Meghan attends something, she is seeking attention.
If Meghan does not attend something, her absence speaks volumes.
Royal journalism has finally constructed a perpetual-motion machine.
Physics said it couldn’t be done.
Nobody asked the Daily Mail.
“New Blow” Leaves Sussexes Somehow Still Alive
Page Six characterized Charles’s intervention as a “new blow.”
This raises an important scientific question:
How many blows can two people receive before newspapers are legally required to admit they seem fine?
Harry and Meghan have endured “blows,” “snubs,” “humiliations,” “fresh humiliations,” “brutal blows,” “major setbacks,” “warnings,” “olive branches,” “olive branches withdrawn,” “doors slammed shut” and various unnamed Palace insiders being “furious.”
At this point, the couple should resemble Wile E. Coyote.
Instead they’re reportedly living in Britain with two children while maintaining commercial interests and charitable projects.
Some blow.
One imagines Harry reading the headline over coffee.
“Meg, apparently Father’s devastated us again.”
“What happened?”
“We remain private citizens.”
“Dear God.”
“I know.”
“Should we cancel dinner?”
Buckingham Palace Introduces Radical Concept Called Consistency
The actual substance of the King’s position is remarkably straightforward.
The Sussexes stepped away from frontline royal duties in 2020.
Their return to Britain does not reverse that arrangement.
They won’t represent the monarch as working royals.
Their independent activities remain independent.
That’s it.
The remarkable aspect is that Britain apparently needed a fresh memorandum explaining this.
Imagine resigning from Tesco in 2020, moving to California, returning six years later and discovering Tesco has issued guidance to the Army confirming you still don’t work the tills.
“We simply wanted to avoid confusion.”
“Who was confused?”
“The cavalry.”
The London Prat’s Completely Unscientific Royal Survey
The London Prat’s Department of Constitutional Guesswork asked an entirely unscientific sample of people what King Charles’s announcement means.
Thirty-one percent said Harry isn’t a working royal.
Thirty-one percent said Meghan isn’t a working royal.
Thirty-seven percent said they knew this already.
One percent was a royal correspondent who screamed, “THIS CHANGES EVERYTHING,” before sprinting toward a satellite truck.
The mathematics may not add up.
Neither does the coverage.
Charles Faces His Greatest Enemy: Headlines Requiring Drama
There is also something splendidly ironic about Charles trying to “avoid doubt or confusion.”
The modern monarchy survives partly because of doubt and confusion.
What exactly does everyone do?
Nobody wants too much detail.
The mystery helps.
The King meets somebody.
William opens something.
Anne appears somewhere unexpectedly wearing sensible shoes.
Edward attends a committee.
Camilla hosts a reception.
Nobody asks too many questions because suddenly you’ve ruined the magic.
But Harry walks into a podcast studio and Britain needs constitutional cartography.
People reported Harry was recently seen at a London studio working on an undisclosed project.
Undisclosed?
That word alone can feed Fleet Street for four days.
HARRY’S SECRET PROJECT
Then:
WHAT IS HARRY HIDING?
Followed by:
EXPERT REVEALS SECRET PROJECT MAY INVOLVE PROJECT
And eventually:
KING ‘CONCERNED’ AS HARRY CONTINUES HAVING EMPLOYMENT
Nation Reassured Nothing Happened
By evening, the constitutional order remained intact.
Charles was still King.
William remained heir.
Harry and Meghan remained non-working royals.
Buckingham Palace remained Buckingham Palace.
And Britain’s newspapers had successfully transformed “no change” into approximately the emotional equivalent of Waterloo.
That may be the real genius of the monarchy.
Kings used to conquer France.
Modern kings send memoranda.
And modern newspapers, unwilling to surrender several centuries of dramatic tradition merely because absolutely nothing happened, provide the cannon fire themselves.
Tomorrow’s likely exclusive:
KING CHARLES BREAKS SILENCE AGAIN BY FAILING TO ISSUE ANOTHER LETTER
Palace sources declined to comment.
Which means, naturally:
CRISIS DEEPENS.
15 Humorous Observations Before the Palace Clarifies That Nothing Has Changed
- King Charles has “broken his silence” by not speaking. A Lord Chamberlain sent a letter. By this standard, every electricity bill is the power company breaking its silence.
- The great royal bombshell is that Harry and Meghan remain exactly what they were yesterday. British newspapers have successfully converted administrative continuity into breaking news.
- The Palace sent guidance to government officials, military leaders and lord lieutenants, presumably because there was a genuine danger that the Royal Artillery might accidentally make Meghan Colonel-in-Chief before lunch.
- Charles apparently wanted to prevent “doubt or confusion.” Unfortunately this placed him directly in conflict with the entire economic model of the British royal press.
- Harry and Meghan are officially private citizens with titles, worldwide fame, paparazzi and a letter from the King explaining their constitutional position. Exactly like your neighbour Dave.
- Their HRH styles remain in abeyance, a wonderfully British phrase meaning, “You still technically own this extremely fancy thing but please don’t take it out of the cupboard.”
- The newspapers call this a “new blow to the couple.” Apparently being reminded of an arrangement you voluntarily entered six years ago now qualifies as blunt-force constitutional trauma.
- Royal journalism has reached quantum mechanics: Harry and Meghan can simultaneously be irrelevant private citizens and the subject of 47 articles before breakfast.
- Every royal story now contains the phrase “King Charles breaks silence,” even when Charles communicates through a staff member, stationery and several layers of protocol. Soon: King Breaks Silence on Tesco Clubcard Through Expressionless Footman.
- Britain has rediscovered the constitutional principle known as Half-In, Half-Out, which newspapers describe as impossible despite themselves being half journalism, half daytime soap opera.
- The Sussexes returned to Britain in August. The newspapers reacted as if Napoleon had landed at Dover carrying a Netflix contract.
- Charles reportedly welcomes seeing more of the family privately, while officially emphasizing they remain outside royal duties. Only the monarchy could require separate paperwork for being somebody’s dad and being their sovereign.
- The Palace says Harry and Meghan’s charitable activities remain private. Britain immediately assigned approximately every royal correspondent in Christendom to monitor these private activities.
- Newspapers spent years demanding Harry and Meghan become private citizens. Now that the Palace says they are private citizens, newspapers are running headlines demanding to know what this shocking development means.
- The whole story can be summarized in six words: “Nothing Changed, Palace Confirms Once Again.” Unfortunately that headline would leave seventeen royal experts unemployed by teatime.
Disclaimer: This satire exaggerates royal protocol, newspaper melodrama and Britain’s apparently inexhaustible ability to turn family administration into a national emergency. The underlying reported fact is considerably simpler: King Charles authorized guidance reaffirming that Prince Harry and Meghan remain non-working members of the Royal Family following their return to Britain.
This story is entirely a human collaboration between two sentient beings: the world’s oldest tenured professor and a philosophy major turned dairy farmer. Neither has been offered an HRH title, although both remain available should the Palace suddenly run short.
Alan Nafzger was born in Lubbock, Texas, the son Swiss immigrants. He grew up on a dairy in Windthorst, north central Texas. He earned degrees from Midwestern State University (B.A. 1985) and Texas State University (M.A. 1987). University College Dublin (Ph.D. 1991). Dr. Nafzger has entertained and educated young people in Texas colleges for 37 years. Nafzger is best known for his dark novels and experimental screenwriting. His best know scripts to date are Lenin’s Body, produced in Russia by A-Media and Sea and Sky produced in The Philippines in the Tagalog language. In 1986, Nafzger wrote the iconic feminist western novel, Gina of Quitaque. He currently lives in Holloway, North London. Contact: [email protected]
