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Prince Harry had no intention to damage royal family with his memoir

Prince Harry claims he had no intention of damaging the British royal family with his autobiography, but reconciliation now seems impossible after he painted a critical picture of his relatives and settled decades-old scores.

“I would like to get my father back. I would like to have my brother back,” he said in an interview with UK channel ITV prior to Tuesday’s publication of his memoir Spare, adding he was “100%” convinced a reconciliation could happen.

But no-one, including Harry, has been spared in the drama surrounding the book’s release.

‘Dirty laundry’

In the memoir, Harry admits his adolescence was marked by drugs and alcohol.

Plenty of ink is spilled on attacking his father King Charles III, brother William, stepmother and now Queen Consort Camilla and his sister-in-law Kate.

Charles is due to be crowned on 6 May, but “I can’t really see how” a family reconciliation is possible, Pauline Maclaran, a professor at London’s Royal Holloway University and author of a book on the monarchy, told AFP.

“He’s come out with so many things that are offensive to members of his family, personal details,” she said.

“If he had any empathy or compassion, which is supposed to be at the root of the Archewell foundation [created by Harry and his wife Meghan Markle], it’s kind of got lost in all this,” she added.

Harry recounts how his father did not embrace him as he broke the news of the death of his mother Diana, when the prince was just 12 years old, instead leaving him alone in his room.

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The king was “not cut out” to be a single parent, Harry claims.

But most of his vengeance is saved for his “beloved brother, my arch-nemesis” William.

‘William never gave Meghan a chance’

Harry claims William never gave his wife Meghan a chance.

Things came to a head during a 2019 argument in which Harry claims his brother threw him to the ground, smashing a dog bowl.

Harry describes a lifelong rivalry between William “the heir” and himself, “the spare”.

He accuses Camilla of having waged “a campaign aimed at marriage and eventually the crown”.

The list of acknowledgements takes up two pages at the end of his memoir, but no member of the royal family is listed.

Instead, he namechecks “all the professionals, medical experts and coaches for keeping me physically and mentally strong over the years”.

His reliance on professionals has led the king, Camilla and William to believe that Harry has been “kidnapped by a cult of psychotherapy” and any attempts at reconciliation will fail, according to royal sources quoted by The Independent newspaper.

The Sun said he crossed a red line by going after Camilla.