The Ludgrove Matron

[Radyward]

How awful of him to name this poor woman and discuss her disability and thY He didn't find her "HOT" words fail me . The poor woman. Her poor family. I mean how old is She now. Implicated in this crazy book

Isn't Eugene the only cousin who he has a relationship with now? I wonder how she feels about this I mean it was important to ber to show her scars on her wedding day to raise awareness of the condition and she spoke of her surgery too

I'm not a Harry defender.

I would say though, that he describes a bullying staff member in that passage, and how the DCs 'got their own back'.

I think that's why he lacks empathy there. It's not an unprovoked attack on a poor sweet woman doing her best for the kids.

It is totally inappropriate language, completely tone deaf and lacking any reflection. He could have said 'she was the strictest matron and wasn't always fair, so we made her life a misery. With hindsight her physical disability must have given her terrible pain, and our mockery must have stung. Kids can be brutal!'

I started this worried for him, because it has so clearly misfired and he felt vulnerable to me.
I'm ending it wondering if he is actually a nasty piece of work.

It doesn't really matter @picklemewalnuts what the intention was. The rest of us manage to manage our language so as not to make the disability of a person the THING. He just rode straight through the rules and made a nasty charicature using her disability to reinforce a hateful image. It's unnecessary and cruel and plays to every old fashioned trope of someone who has scoliosis.
It's so awful that I do wonder why or how it slipped through. Wouldn't a canny editor have thought ooooooer how will this play? What about Megan? Wouldn't she have read it and had alarm bells set off. It's all just too dreadful. And so are they.

I can't understand how he read this stuff aloud and didn't panic.

You can't blame the ghost writer stitching him up, given he read it aloud !

Precisely @picklemewalnuts . It's bizarre.

And then there's this - the strange comment about Africa being the domain of one brother or the other. It's so out of synch with he way we view empire and whole continents thewww.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/jan/11/william-harry-africa-colonial-princes-continent

Thank you, Boulshired; I suppose just about the only good thing if the lady's no longer with us is that she can no longer be hurt by this - though other sufferers certainly can

The more I think about this the more appalling it seems.

The disableist mockery is sickening, and as others have said it is as if he has had total amnesia about his cousin Eugenie's scoliosis, her surgery, her charity work and the visual statement she made on her wedding day about it. Harry then read the book out loud, so he knew exactly what those words were.

Supposedly he and Meghan are close to Eugenie, good friends. They socialised together, spoke frequently.

I have a spinal condition that affects my life. I actually feel repulsed by this passage and Harry's willingness to write it in this crass, nasty and snobby way and leave it in, especially given he has now revealed he made extensive cuts to the book eslewhere.

I agree. To all of this.

I wonder if Eugenie's finally had enough of being the 'go between'.

I agree with this. He is writing it as he experienced it as a child.

He is writing it as he experienced it as a child

True enough, but wasn't the book supposed to be about "the man he's become"?

Few have blamed what Harry did at 12, probably because we all know some boys can behave horribly, but couching it in terms of having learned not to behave like this might have helped - whereas the spiteful, insult-filled account he actually did write just makes him sound vile

I’ve had one bully at school if they decided to write about it to show their development arc then I’d be absolutely fuming. A simple “when I was 12 I treated a member of school staff appallingly and I’m ashamed of that behaviour” would of sufficed.

Fair point about using the matron at all in his narrative, Boulshired
As you suggest, the whole anecdote would probably have been better left out, doubly so because of the way he handled the telling, but all the same it's illuminating about his personality

I don’t have scoliosis but I do have a problem with my knees which is most obvious when I’m on stairs/slopes… if someone wrote about me in such a mocking fashion I would be devastated.

What an absolute asshole he is.

Absolutely @Boulshired - the lady might be dead. But the passage perpetuated so many disablist triodes that it hardly matters. So much for his empathy!

For the crimes and failings of not having swishy hair, youth and bodily perfection according to Harry (aged 38 and a quarter), Pat must be immortalised in shit prose by a spoiled twat who went through Eton, Sandhurst and being given the Dukedom of Sussex as a wedding present.

It's odd he feels no shame, no self-reflection or sorrow. He just projects some nonsense emotions onto her in his adult writing.

I could perhaps imagine Harry relating this anecdote in a kind of blokey way, in the sessions withi the ghost writer. But how could he not see how incredibly bad this makes him look? Did Harry really read the printed text or maybe he just skimmed over it.

I've got a question for those who have the audiobook. I've seen a suggestion on another site that Harry may not have actually narrated the whole text; that a sample of his spoken voice may have been used to modify text-to-speech software. Does that seem plausible when you listen to it?

Otherwise, I can't understand how he could relate that anecdote, see it written down, and then speak it out loud into a microphone - all the while having no realisation of how others might view it.

And that's the problem hoteltango. He can't see it. There is one person with feelings in his world and nobody understands him. I'd be ashamed to have produced such a damaged individual. He will never have enough of anything and I feel sorry for everyone associated with him.

But he didn't say it was her who bullied him

Being strict around a bunch of teen boys isn't bullying

I read the 'grabbing a fistful' and the poking of cuts and the stupidity of going to see her with a problem as more severe than perhaps they are. I read her as an angry, grabby, shouty woman, attempting to exert control by bullying the children. That's not strictness or discipline, especially when you are the house 'parent' rather than the teacher.

You don’t think there might be a smidgen of hyperbole in that? Bullying? I think not.

I read it and certainly did find it cruel and insensitive.

I stopped reading the book because there were a few passages like that, just downright mean for no reason. It left a very unpleasant taste in my mouth.

but this child was accompanied by a police protection officer. Surely if anything unpleasant and bullying was going on, he could have asked his security to help him. Don't forget that the staff would have been expected to call young Harry Sir and Your Royal Highness. They would all be on their best behaviour with the royal children. Do you think Louis is grabbed by staff at school?

Don't forget that the staff would have been expected to call young Harry Sir and Your Royal Highness.

I don’t think they would. They’d have been told to treat him exactly like all the other boys but you’re right, they’d definitely have treated Harry with kid gloves.

I don't believe, for a second, that you've either bought or read the book.