I suspect that I am drawn to The Crown because of my mother: passive-aggressive palace intrigue, court etiquette, thwarted love affairs, and stifled emotions. My mother, who died in 2019, was, to a certain degree obsessed. She owned dozens of books. Read the latest (non-British) tabloids, and, as the era of Diana, Princess of Wales came to the fore in the early 80s and died on August 4, 1997, her fascination grew and her sympathy for a woman who appeared to have everything grew.

Fairytale. That word. A young woman on the edges of the larger royal circle, appears to be taken off into a world centuries years old, one that must produce an heir and act with tact and decorum at all times. But how does one learn ? This episode brilliantly illustrates how isolating this world can be: One minute, you’re dancing to “Edge of Seventeen” with your flat mates (played wonderfully by Emma Corrwin), and then endless drills and memorization, isolated as her fiancé, played with self pitying melancholy by Josh O’Connor (not for nothing does Princess Anne call him “Eeyore”) travels and mopes because soon, the love of his life, Camilla Parker-Bowles, will have to be publicly (if not privately) cast aside.

“Gestures reveal us. One should never try to show emotion.” This is the teaching of Diana’s grandmother, and ultimately Diana rebelled against it. I think this is some of why Diana resonated so powerfully with my mother: she was married to a man who was uncomfortable with emotion, and yet in her public life, she was loved. She lived with long term adultery that she had to overlook, and she battled with psychological illness.  I saw how devastated she was when Diana died; I hesitate to say that Diana was a hero for my mother, but she saw her as a survivor, and my mother was that, too.

The most perfect touch of this episode comes at the end. The wedding that an entire nation has been waiting for isn’t shown. Instead, we get Diana’s back, and that impossibly long train, and for all of us who know the long, sad history, it almost feels like an ending. There’s no fairytale here. It’s suiting up and showing up and trying to smile through secrets and lies and wondering if your new husband loves you at all.

“In a flood of tears
That no one really ever heard fall at all.”—Stevie Nicks, “Edge of Seventeen”

Sarah Nichols lives and writes in Connecticut. She is the author of ten chapbooks, including Press Play for Heartbreak (Paper Nautilus Press, 2021) and Hexenhaus (Milk and Cake Press, 2020.) Her poems and essays have also appeared in Buffalo (x8), Sad Girl Review, and Rhino.