The Rockstar Princess

Fetishised for her beauty, famous for her rudeness, the anarchic life of Princess Margaret is tinged with sadness and humour.

- Diana Wichtel

Princess Margaret. Who? Once she was second in line to the throne. Once she was bigger than the Beatles. In his playful contribution to the art of experimental biography, Ma’am Darling: 99 glimpses of Princess Margaret, English critic and satirist Craig Brown includes a photo to prove it. The beaming “Fab Four” are being presented at the 1963 Royal Variety Performance. “You feel the Beatles are about to be more famous than her. Or perhaps they’ve just edged away,” muses Brown. He could speculate forever on these sorts of calculations.

“The people in the cheaper seats clap your hands. And the rest of you, if you’d just rattle your jewellery,” John Lennon famously advised the audience. History draws a veil over whether the Princess was amused. As the by-then problematic younger sister of Queen Elizabeth II, she may not have appreciated being, once again, outshone.

Brown to the rescue: he resurrects her over 400 rollicking pages. Even he had doubts about a whole book on the haughty, hedonistic, legendarily pointless Princess. Some royals so key to his generation – he’s 61 – have faded into obscurity. He asked his 28-year-old son to name the Queen’s children. “He said, ‘Well, there’s Charles. And there’s that woman, Anne.’ There was a big pause and he said, ‘Steve?’” Off with his head.