Hilary Mantel's controversial 'plastic princess' remarks about Duchess of Cambridge spark furious row

 
Tom Harper20 February 2013

A furious row erupted today after one of Britain’s leading authors described the Duchess of Cambridge as a “plastic” princess whose “only point and purpose” is to give birth.

Thousands of people attacked Hilary Mantel on Twitter after the double Booker Prize-winning novelist launched a controversial critique of Kate Middleton, while others defended her.

The 60-year-old author of Wolf Hall and Bring Up The Bodies claimed the Duchess’s public image “appeared to have been designed by a committee and built by craftsmen, with a perfect plastic smile and the spindles of her limbs hand-turned and gloss-varnished”.

Royal commentators and former Conservative MP Edwina Currie rushed to defend pregnant Kate after Ms Mantel described her as “painfully thin” and a “shop-window mannequin, with no personality of her own, entirely defined by what she wore”.

Hugo Vickers, who has written a biography of the Queen Mother, said: “It is a great pity that Hilary Mantel feels the need to do this. She has done pretty well with her books, she doesn’t need to stoop to the level of criticising Kate Middleton. She is first royal bride to have a university degree and is a highly sophisticated young lady.

“She is not a plastic doll, she is quite feisty and she is doing a very good job.”

Edwina Currie, a former health minister under John Major, tweeted: “It seems unfair for Hilary Mantel…to have a go at Kate.

“Duchess of Cambridge doesn’t turn herself into ‘shop window mannequin’, we do. She’s a smart St Andrews graduate, Mantel should have said so.

“I’ve met and listened to Hilary Mantel several times, exceptional brain, funny and clever, not usually snide in public. Departure for her.”

However, many people rushed to defend Ms Mantel on Twitter. Cambridge historian and television presenter Mary Beard told the Evening Standard: “Mantel was not pulling any punches to be sure, but I thought it was not a diatribe, but an analysis of the construction of the female royal body, which had some sharp words for those - and this is honestly almost all of us - who idolise that body, then pull it to pieces.

“Good on Mantel for speaking clearly and acutely, and not venomously.”

Ms Mantel, whose novels detail the failure of Henry VIII’s wives to produce an heir, used a lecture earlier this month to examine the prospects for the future queen consort.

She said: “Royal persons are both gods and beasts. They are persons but they are supra-personal, carriers of a blood line: at the most basic, they are breeding stock, collections of organs.”

Later, the novelist asked whether the monarchy is a “suitable institution for a grown-up nation”, adding: “I think that question is rather like, should we have pandas or not? Our current royal family doesn’t have the difficulties in breeding that pandas do, but pandas and royal persons alike are expensive to conserve and ill-adapted to any modern environment.

“But aren’t they interesting? Aren’t they nice to look at? Some people find them endearing; some pity them for their precarious situation; everybody stares at them, and however airy the enclosure they inhabit, it’s still a cage.”

The provocative lecture triggered thousands of comments on Twitter. Kay Cugini tweeted: “Cheap nasty shot Hilary Mantel, that won’t sell your books or win you friends, bitching about a pregnant womans’ shape is just that – bitchy.”

Vivian Kelly: “Hilary Mantel is just plain rude!” Another added: “Hilary Mantel looks like a plastic princess that melted over a bonfire of jealousy.”

The head of a charity supported by the Duchess of Cambridge has hit back at Hilary Mantel’s extraordinary attack on her, saying she is an “intelligent” woman who is proving to be a huge asset to the causes she backs.

The head of a charity supported by the Duchess of Cambridge also hit back.

Nick Barton, chief executive of Action on Addiction, said the Booker prize-winning author was entirely wrong to characterise the Duchess as a clothes horse whose only purpose was to give birth.

Speaking ahead of a visit by the Duchess to Hope House, an addiction recovery centre for women in Clapham, Mr Barton said: “I can only speak of what I know, and having met the Duchess several times I find her to be engaging, natural and genuinely interested in the subject.

“You can tell a lot about someone from the questions they ask and she asks really good questions, the questions of someone who wants to learn. She is also an intelligent woman.

“Having her as Patron of the charity draws attention to the cause of addiction as a whole, which is not always an easy subject.”

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