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RICHARD DIMBLEBY: In this garment of white, in such contrast to the splendors about her, she will move for the first time to King Edward's chair.
SCOTT SIMON, HOST:
In 1953, Elizabeth Windsor was crowned queen live on the BBC. And leading up to the coronation, a 10-year-old boy won an essay contest held by the Liverpool Public Libraries in which he wrote, quote, "no rioting nor killing will take place because present-day royalty rules with affection rather than force."
CRAIG BROWN: That 10-year-old boy was Paul McCartney.
SIMON: Author and essayist Craig Brown joins us now. He took on another royal several years ago in his book "Ninety-Nine Glimpses Of Princess Margaret." And in this new volume, he has hoovered up - to use a British phrase - a voluminous survey of what's been written and observed about the woman who sat on the British throne for more than 70 years. His book, "Q: A Voyage Around The Queen." Craig Brown, thank you so much for being with us.
BROWN: It's a pleasure.
SIMON: And let's begin to talk about the reaction she inspired from people who never, of course, had the chance to meet her. Anne Frank had a special regard for what was then Princess Elizabeth, didn't she?
BROWN: Yes. Anne Frank kept a picture of then-Princess Elizabeth on her wall in her hiding place in the attic in Amsterdam. And they also had a picture of Princess Margaret. And she mentions them in the diary, and Anne is speculating about who Princess Elizabeth might marry and that kind of thing. Throughout her life, she was a symbol of different things for different people, but she was definitely a symbol of hope and a sort of dream world, I suppose, for Anne Frank in her plight.
SIMON: Even hard-nosed, skeptical and accomplished people got a little stressed out about meeting her, didn't they?
BROWN: Yes. Even Marilyn Monroe, Joan Crawford, you know, who was obviously quite a hard nut, said she'd never been so frightened in her life. And all they were doing was shaking hands with the queen before a film premiere. But Marilyn Monroe, the queen later said to someone that she realized that Marilyn was nervous because she saw that she'd licked all her lipstick off.
SIMON: She had a special regard for and became identified with her corgis. What do you think she - Elizabeth felt for those little dogs?
BROWN: (Laughter) Well, you say little dogs, but they are also quite ferocious dogs. I compare them to the Corleone family 'cause they were quite vicious. There was sort of blood everywhere. What I suspect she liked about them was their disorder. So the queen had this incredibly disciplined life. She'd know what she was doing three years ahead, you know, obviously, had to be polite all the time, and everyone was polite to her. And I think what she liked about the corgis is their complete lack of reverence for her. And also horses. Some people suggested she liked corgis and horses more than she liked her own family.
SIMON: Well - and that introduces a question. You are, of course, the author of "Ninety-Nine Glimpses Of Princess Margaret." What was their relationship...
BROWN: Yes.
SIMON: ...Like?
BROWN: Their relationship was unlike it was portrayed in "The Crown," actually. Princess Margaret wasn't envious of the queen, and the queen wasn't envious of her. Princess Margaret was always worried that she would embarrass the queen. Obviously, sometimes, she did, but she'd have this recurrent nightmare that she'd done something really awful. She'd then wake up, and she'd have to - in real life, as it were - hear the queen's voice to be reassured, and then she could carry on.
I mean, they had had this very, very close childhood together during the war. They were completely different characters, but there was great fondness. I was told recently that the queen avoided the crown not just because a lot of it was bogus, but because she had a sort of residual guilt about Princess Margaret because Princess Margaret's life had kind of gone in the wrong directions. I think the queen, by the end of Princess Margaret's life, was feeling sorry for her.
SIMON: 2012 London Olympics, I have to tell you, I saw a whole new side of Queen Elizabeth when she jumped out of a helicopter with James Bond during the opening ceremonies. We have some audio of that, in fact.
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UNIDENTIFIED COMMENTATOR: Gasps all the way around the stadium.
SIMON: We should explain this was pure theater with Daniel Craig.
BROWN: It was rather extraordinary. I think the queen once said to President Chirac, I think, of France. He said, if you hadn't been queen, what would you like to have been? And she replied, I'd like to have been an actress. And he said, well, in a way, you have been an actress. And she said, yes, but I've only been playing one role all my life. I think it was after her mother died. I think that gave the queen a kind of new license to have fun. She was always slightly looking over her shoulder, worried her mother wouldn't approve. And then, late in life, she did James Bond for the Olympics. And then, of course, she acted with Paddington Bear.
SIMON: Right. Kept a marmalade sandwich in her purse, as I recall.
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BEN WHISHAW: (As Paddington Bear) Perhaps you would like a marmalade sandwich. I always keep one for emergencies.
QUEEN ELIZABETH II: (As self) So do I. I keep mine in here.
WHISHAW: (As Paddington Bear) Whoa.
ELIZABETH II: (As self) For later.
BROWN: In a funny way, the whole history of the royal family from the mid-20th century onwards is one of slipping into showbiz. And she did it actually very well, I think.
SIMON: I wrote down the words of Philip Larkin, the celebrated poet, who I guess had more than a dozen brushes with her...
BROWN: Yes.
SIMON: ...And wrote, in time when nothing stood but worsened or grew strange, this was one constant good - she did not change.
BROWN: In a funny way, her character didn't change. Accounts of her character from her governess showed that, really, at the age of 3 or 4, her character was formed. She was always very dutiful, very well-behaved, very neat and tidy. The constancy of her character was a key to her success. I mean, Gore Vidal once said to Princess Margaret that in his brief meeting with the queen he found her heavy going. Princess Margaret replied, but that's what she's there for.
And that's what made her a kind of anchor to people - emotional anchor. And I think that's almost the principal theme of my book. People, when they saw her, they saw - refracted through her fame, they saw themselves. They reckon a third of British people dreamt about her. And I've got a lot of people's dreams in my book. So she inhabited the psyche of a nation.
SIMON: Craig Brown, his new book, "Q: A Voyage Around The Queen." Thank you so much for being with us.
BROWN: Thank you very much. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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