Classic Reissue: Meet Meghan Markle
Vanity Fair offered a very proper introduction to a future Duchess.
I had toyed with whether or not to dedicate an issue of the newsletter to Meghan Markle when I first wrote this piece in 2022. There is certainly a doorstep-sized thesis to be written on her relationship with the press, especially on my side of the pond, and how it reflects the media’s ingrained sexism, racism, xenophobia, and willingness to adhere to the smothering tenets of royalism above all else. I’ve written about her many times before, mostly over on Pajiba, but that work is mostly written without her involvement. It's work about her, not involving her, per se. We could get into the ins and outs of royal press access, leaked sources, and the like, but for our purposes, there aren’t many examples of Meghan in the royal circles giving her side of the story. There is, of course, the Oprah interview, but that’s for another day. This issue, we looked at her side of the story before there was a wedding, an engagement, or a concerted effort by her so-called allies to silence her.
Vanity Fair. "Meghan Markle, Wild About Harry!" September 6, 2017. Sam Kashner.
This profile was published just over two months before Markle’s engagement to Prince Harry was announced, and about ten months after their relationship was made public by the press. So, it seems easy to surmise that Meghan was engaged when the piece came out. At the very least, she and Harry knew they were super-serious about one another. Other royal girlfriends didn’t do these kinds of interviews, certainly not when they were miles away from getting engaged and being welcomed into the supposedly protective fold of the palace. Of course, this case was different.
Harry had already made a very candid statement of support towards Meghan that condemned the misogyny and racism the press had pelted at her once it was revealed she was his girlfriend. Even Kate Middleton didn’t get that kind of declaration after a decade of dating Prince William. So, with this Vanity Fair interview, I feel like Markle’s intention was to get what she may have seen as the last chance for her to go on the record as herself, a single woman, without the smothering binds of the Firm wrapped around her. In a sense, it was just another day at the office for her.
