Thursday, February 5, 2015

Catherine Mayer author of "Charles: Heart of a King" Ill-informed?


So Catherine Mayer writes an unauthorized 2 star rated "biography" of Prince Charles but instead of doing her best to remain objective and let the Prince's words and actions speak for themselves allowing the readers to come to their own conclusions she turns her work into a rag by weaving in her own conclusions.
I looked up her credentials. Not very impressive but worthy of an intern, many of her "articles" are her opinion.
Let's look at what other small amount of info is on this woman - based on the bad reviews of her writing I am abstaining from calling her an author - she is a american, married to a Marxist, she states she was a Republican who is now a monarchist - whatever the heck that means - so her political background seems somewhat shaky. Her first article was in 2004 in the Evening Standard, the remaining few were spotty, then she wrote a book.
Now also on her VITA is an entry that to the uninformed mind looks impressive, she is an editor at large at the TIMES, which Times I am not certain, but an editor in large means she is still subject to the direction and oversight of chief editors and executive editors, she may come up with ideas for other writers to research and write. "At large" means as an editor she has no specific assignments, but rather works on whatever interests her. Further she could be that valuable that the publication she works at thinks she is very talented or they simply need another editor in a very large pool of journalists and have no specific place to put her so they plunge her into that pool of journalists within the publication.
Based on her body of work I don't think she is in the valuable sector - Piers Morgan is in the valuable sector.
I do think she she consciously created this controversial book as an effort to stir the pot and get some notoriety, I hope it doesn't blow up in her face - this is either a brilliant move when it comes to self promotion or the biggest mistake of her short career.
Not sure she what sort of research she has done into monarchies. Even a high schooler can pick a famous or infamous monarch off the top of their head who were perverse in private life, downright ruthless in their politics but quite successful throughout their monarchy. Or not -  the unsuccessful ones often endured the consequences of an ineffectual reign. This is the inherent risk of a monarchy and why people all over the world are not supportive of a monarchy in their country. In modern England the Monarchy does not have free reign to rule and if they are not good leaders in the interest of the country, Parliament strongly influences through one means or another
So I can only shake my head and say to Catherine Mayer, choose your battles better and hope it works out for you.

Prince Charles 'understands limitations' of Crown
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-31135061

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