‘Rebel Prince’ by Tom Bower was published on Thursday and portrays the image of a man who there is little positive to say about.
Throughout the book the Prince of Wales is implied to be obsessed with the public opinion of him yet be completely divorced from any kind of reality.
According to the book which has been published by William Collins, the sight of an unknown plastic substance covering his dinner, which turned out to be cling film, once caused Prince Charles to “tremble” and “shriek”.
Tom Bower also goes on to claim that once on a visit to a friend, Prince Charles even arrived armed with his own mattress, toilet seat and Kleenex Velvet toilet paper so as not to have to use those which has already been provided for him.
Bower has claimed that in order to put together the biography, he interviewed more than 120 people to gain an insight in to the Prince of Wales life.
In his time the author has written the biographies of many other high ranking men in society including Tony Blair, Richard Branson and Mohamed Fayed, and with his slating style of writing, it is could be that Prince Charles was just the next in line to be torn apart.
The book reports that the Prince of Wales once took a Club Class flight to Hong Kong and it claims that he reported in his journal afterwards “It took me some time to realise… that this was not first class (!) although it puzzled me as to why the seat seemed so uncomfortable. Such is the end of the Empire, I sighed to myself.”
It is also reported in the book that Prince Charles has a team of staff who help him with his day-to-day life, including valets to help him change his clothes, four gardeners who, as the book states, “lie flat-nose down on a trailer” just to hand pluck weeds and please the prince who has a hatred of pesticides.
The Prince of Wales is also reported by Tom Bower to have arrived at functions with a police officer carrying his own pre-mixed martinis and an aide with a bag of food for him to be served.
Throughout the whole book, Prince Charles is detailed to be a very discontented man, complaining about whatever he can, down to the temperature of his office.
One part of the read even highlights a meeting between the prince and Peter Mandelson during which the former minister apparently revealed to the prince that the public thought he was “rather glum and dispirited” and with the book also suggesting that Prince Charles was “paralysed with guilt” in the wake of Princess Diana’s death, it is difficult to see if Bower has anything positive to say about the prince.
But whatever your opinion of him, and whether or not this book changes it, Prince Charles has been a prolific royal for all his life and it would seem he is never going to be able to please everyone.
