Diana (6 page)

At the honeymoon press conference, she was asked what she thought of married life. “Highly recommended,” she replied.

Asked by the press on her honeymoon if she’d cooked breakfast yet, she replied, “I don’t eat breakfast.”

On the honeymoon ship, she happened upon a group of men wearing only towels around their waists. “It’s all right. I’m a married woman now, aren’t I?”

“Do you know, I have never been happier.”

Oil billionaire Armand Hammer told Diana: “You know, I can’t say no to the Prince, whatever he asks me to do. I have so much confidence in him that if he asked me to jump through that window there, I think I’d jump through.” The Princess smiled and replied, “Well, I’d jump right after you!”

In a letter to her former nanny, Mary Clarke, shortly after her marriage: “I do get annoyed at not being able to do my washing and general ironing. I know sister Sarah would adore that situation! … I might even have to learn to ride a horse, Mary, as it is the only time I will ever see my husband on his own…. I adore being married and having someone to devote my time to.”

Charles asked her if she’d ever read Rudyard Kipling’s
Just So Stories.
“Just so
what?”
she asked.

“I enjoy Danielle Steel’s books, but my husband disapproves. He doesn’t like me reading light novels.”

In 1985: “I see my role as supporting my husband whenever I can and always being behind him, encouraging him. It’s most important being a mother and a wife—that’s what I try to achieve. Whether I do is another thing, but I do try.”

In December 1985, Diana danced onstage at the Royal Opera House, to the surprise of the audience—and Charles, for whom the performance was a Christmas gift. After eight curtain calls, she turned to Wayne Sleep, who’d partnered her onstage, and said laughingly, “Beats the wedding.”

“We both liked people. We both liked country life. Both loved children, work in the cancer field, work in hospices.”

By 1987: “Prince Charles loves [Highgrove] and it’s my dream home now.”

Later, her feelings reversed. Highgrove, where Camilla acted as hostess at dinners for Charles’s close friends, was, for Diana, “a return to prison.”