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So high is the level of hysteria, it wouldn’t be surprising to discover that Princess Catherine has pricked her finger on a spinning wheel and fallen into an enchanted sleep. Since she went into hospital for abdominal surgery in January, and then remained out of view, speculation has ranged from her being in a coma, to having a facelift, to getting a divorce.
对于如此高度的歇斯底里，若发现凯特王妃因纺车刺伤手指而陷入魔法睡眠，恐怕也不会令人感到意外。自从她1月份因腹部手术入院以来，随后便鲜少露面，外界的猜测从她处于昏迷状态、进行了整容手术，到她正准备离婚等各种说法纷纷出现。
The Mother’s Day snap with her children, released in a clear attempt to end the relentless rumours, has instead stoked them. For once, the royal family must have wished for Meghan and Harry to pop up and divert attention from obsessive discussions about the photo-editing of a cardigan sleeve — all of it a cover for wanting to know what is really going on.
为了试图终结那些无止境的谣言，她发布了与孩子们庆祝母亲节的照片，结果却意外地助长了谣言。王室这一次恐怕非常希望梅根和哈里能出现，以转移公众对一件开衫袖子照片编辑细节过度解读的注意力——所有这一切，不过是人们想要探究真相的一种表现。
The travails of the Princess of Wales, who endearingly explained that she had clumsily manipulated the picture herself, are a bleak reminder of the Faustian pact between the monarchy and the public. Being on show is what has sustained the royal family for centuries. If someone disappears for too long, the public take their revenge.
威尔士王妃的遭遇，她那令人感到亲切的解释称自己笨手笨脚地编辑了那张照片，这不仅是对君主制与公众之间那种类似浮士德的契约的一种冷酷提醒。数百年来，公开亮相一直是王室得以维持其存在的核心。如果某人消失太长时间，公众便会以自己的方式进行“报复”。
In the 1860s, the widowed Queen Victoria’s prolonged period of mourning for Prince Albert led to the most serious stirring of republican sentiment since the execution of Charles I. As Victoria remained invisible, refusing to meet even foreign dignitaries, MPs and campaigners began suggesting the country could do without the monarchy, with some radicals calling for an end to the public bankrolling of the royal family. Had it not been for a failed assassination attempt that brought her public sympathy — and her Scottish ghillie John Brown urging a return to the limelight — Victoria might have been Britain’s last monarch.
在19世纪60年代，寡居的维多利亚女王(Queen Victoria)为了亡夫阿尔伯特亲王(Prince Albert)而长时间的服丧，引发了自查理一世(Charles I)被处决以来最严重的共和主义情绪。由于维多利亚女王一直隐身，甚至拒绝与外国高官会面，国会议员和活动人士开始建议国家可以不需要君主制，一些激进分子呼吁停止公众资助皇室家族。如果不是因为一次未遂的暗杀企图引起了公众的同情，以及她的苏格兰侍从约翰•布朗(John Brown)敦促她重返公众视野，维多利亚女王可能成为英国的最后一位君主。
The paradox for Catherine is that she is suffering partly because of her popularity. Clothes that she wears regularly sell out, and she has just topped a national poll of royals. But the obsession with her private life may also be a consequence of the accidentally over-slimmed-down institution. With Prince Andrew disgraced, the Sussex circus transplanted to California, and William cancelling some public engagements to look after the couple’s children, the number of working royals has shrunk precipitously. Responsibilities are spread thin, and the personalities to gossip about are limited.
凯特所面临的悖论在于，她的痛苦部分源于她极高的人气。她所穿戴的服饰总是迅速售罄，近期她更是在一项全国性的皇室人气调查中高居榜首。然而，对她私生活的过度关注可能也是因为皇室机构不断缩减的意外后果。随着安德鲁王子因丑闻而名声扫地，苏塞克斯家庭搬迁至加利福尼亚，以及威廉取消一些公务活动以照看孩子，主要承担公务的皇室成员数量急剧减少。责任的负担因而分散，人们可供八卦的对象也相应减少。
Looming above it all, ominously, is King Charles’s cancer. At this week’s Commonwealth Day service in Westminster Abbey, the King spoke by video link.
在这一切之上，更令人忧虑的是查尔斯三世国王(King Charles)的癌症问题。在本周于威斯敏斯特大教堂(Westminster Abbey)举办的英联邦日服务仪式上，国王通过视频链接进行了讲话。
The monarchy remains a global institution with considerable pulling power. The death of the Queen removed a much-loved figure who had been a constant presence in British life, outlasting 15 prime ministers and charming US presidents from Harry Truman to Joe Biden. In America last week, I was struck by how many people, hearing my accent, extended their best wishes for the King’s recovery. Three centuries after independence, I find many Americans more fascinated by the royals than we are. Our monarchs still play an indefinable, yet genuine role in projecting Britain.
英国王室依旧是一个拥有巨大吸引力的全球性机构。女王的逝世意味着一个深受爱戴的人物从英国人的生活中消失，她一直是英国社会的常青藤，历经15任首相，并从哈里•杜鲁门到乔•拜登的美国总统中赢得了无数的心。上周在美国，当人们听到我的口音后，纷纷向我表达对国王康复的良好祝愿，这让我深受感动。三个世纪过去，独立之后，我发现许多美国人对王室的迷恋甚至超过了我们英国人。我们的君主在塑造英国形象方面仍扮演着一个难以明言却真切存在的角色。
Charles’s candour about his condition has been unprecedented, according to royal watchers. He wisely anticipated that being open about having cancer early on would be the right thing to do — and would win him some respite from inquiries about the details. Catherine and William’s advisers have not been quite so shrewd. The poor woman deserves some privacy — not least as a mother of three. Since the death of Princess Diana we have all seen the prurient horror bubble this family endures. But announcing that she would be out of action from December until Easter, with no satisfactory explanation and no public appearances, was not the best way to dampen interest.
根据皇室观察家的说法，查尔斯王子对自己病情的坦诚是前所未有的。他明智地认为，早期公开患癌的事实是正确之举，这不仅能让他避免过多的细节询问，还能为他赢得一丝喘息之机。相比之下，凯特和威廉的顾问们就显得没有那么机敏了。他们并没有那么精明。这位身为三个孩子之母的女士，理应享有一些私人空间。自戴安娜王妃去世以来，我们已经目睹了这个家庭所承受的刺探性恐怖。但宣布她将从12月至复活节期间停止所有公开活动，却没有给出一个令人满意的解释，这并不是减少公众兴趣的最好方式。
It will do the princess’s homespun, friendly image no harm that she decided to take her own family portraits. The photo agencies seem to have delighted in issuing a “kill notice” to take the picture out of circulation and expose her lack of professionalism. But one of the absurd aspects of “Kate-Gate” is that celebrity photo retouching is routine. Portrait painters have been helping the royals for centuries. Cecil Beaton, the great society photographer, used all sorts of tricks to flatter his subjects after replacing what he called “hazardous candid camera shots”. His official 1953 Coronation portrait of Elizabeth II was in fact taken at home, according to the royal biographer Robert Hardman, with a fake Abbey backdrop.
王妃亲手拍摄家庭肖像的决定对她那朴实无华、亲和力十足的形象毫无损害。相反，照片机构发布“撤回通知”以停止照片流通并指出她的非专业性，似乎对此感到十分满意。然而，“凯特门”事件荒唐的一面在于，名人照片修饰早已是业界常态。数个世纪以来，肖像画家就一直在为皇室成员美化形象。著名社会摄影师塞西尔•比顿用尽各种手段来美化他的摄影对象，取代他所说的“危险的抓拍”。根据皇室传记作者罗伯特•哈德曼的说法，他为伊丽莎白二世拍摄的1953年加冕正式肖像实际上是在家中完成的，背景是一个假的大教堂。
Where should the modern line be drawn, between openness and privacy? Part of the royal family’s success has always been its mystique. “We must not let in daylight upon magic,” wrote the constitutionalist Walter Bagehot. The fairytale is built on theatricality, ceremony, duty and service: gratitude for which gives the royals a certain amount of respect for their private lives.
在现代社会，开放与隐私之间的界限应如何划定？皇室家族的部分成功源于其神秘性。“我们绝不可让阳光照入魔法之地，”宪政学者沃尔特•白芝浩(Walter Bagehot)所言。这种童话般的故事是建立在戏剧性、仪式感、责任与服务之上的：正是对这些元素的感激之情，为王室成员的私生活赢得了一定程度的尊重。
How will this play out? “The great advantage the royals have is time”, says Simon Lewis, former communications chief to the Queen. “They can let issues gestate”. Concerns about the prospect of Camilla becoming Queen, for example, were assuaged over a period of years while the idea was gently mooted, debated, considered.
这将如何展开？“王室最大的优势是时间，”女王的前通讯总监西蒙•刘易斯指出。“他们可以让议题逐渐成熟。”比如，对于卡米拉可能成为女王的担忧，在几年时间里通过缓和的提出、讨论和考量而得到了缓解。
And this is an institution that has recovered from far worse. Charles I was beheaded in 1649; the House of Hanover was dogged by sex scandals; George III lost his mind and he also lost America, which wasn’t terribly popular.
而这个机构曾经从更严重的挫折中恢复过来。1649年，查理一世被处决；汉诺威王朝频繁爆出性丑闻；乔治三世不仅失去了理智，也失去了美国，后者并没有得到很好的评价。
Queen Elizabeth II once said that she had to be “seen to be believed”: and that remains the bargain. The enormous goodwill towards Kate seems hard to square with the current level of prying. But they are two sides of the same coin.
伊丽莎白二世女王曾言：“非亲见，难信其真。”这一理念至今仍然适用。人们对凯特的深厚好感似乎难以与当前对她的过度关注相协调。然而，这两者实际上是一枚硬币的两面。