Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
But life goes on, and 2012 will be a summer of celebration with the Olympics
coming to London (July 27-Aug 12), and events being held as far from the capital as
the south coast. There also continues to be a lot to shout about, as a dynamic cultural
milieu of independent thinking, eccentricity and verve, mean talent is often appreci-
ated. From the Academy-award winning
The King's Speech
and Adele's record break-
ing 2nd album
21
to Carol Ann Duffy becoming the first woman Poet Laureate and
Hillary Mantel's critically acclaimed historic novel
Wolf Hall,
these are lands that
revel in diversity.
Britain began believing it was great again in the 1990s. It was the decade of Cool
Britannia. A wave of music—Britpop—from bands such as Blur, Oasis, and Pulp, was
followed by the optimism prompted by the 1997 landslide General Election victory by
Tony Blair's New Labour Party. After nearly 20 years of Conservative governments it
felt like a new era of opportunity. In London, the Millennium Dome opened in 1999
and thousands visited the Millennium Experience, a modern-day Festival of Britain. It
is now a concert venue called the O2—although to most people it is still the Dome.
The
Tate Modern
(p. 109) art museum opened in May 2000 in a former power sta-
tion, and the
London Eye
(p. 107) was also built to celebrate the new millennium.
2
OUR LOVE OF A
royal
WEDDING
We do adore a royal wedding. Prince
Charles and Lady Diana Spencer were
married at St. Paul's Cathedral in London
on July 29, 1981, a ceremony watched by
an estimated global television audience
of 750 million. The fairytale wedding
came 5 months after Charles, 32, had
presented Diana with a memorable sap-
phire and diamond engagement ring. The
wedding day was declared a national
holiday and 600,000 people lined the
wedding procession route to see
20-year-old Diana arrive for the cere-
mony in the royal family's glass coach
with her father, Earl Spencer. Diana's
wedding dress was a fashion hit, made
from ivory taffeta and antique lace with
a spectacular 7.62-m (25-ft.) train. After
the drive to Buckingham Palace in an
open-topped State Landau the couple
appeared on the palace balcony to the
cheers of thousands.
Prince William was born less than a
year later, on June 21, 1982, and Prince
Harry came along on September 15,
1984. However, 9 years later Charles and
Diana had separated, and they divorced
in August 1996.
Tragically, Diana died after a car crash
in Paris on August 31, 1997. Her death
prompted an unprecedented public
outpouring of grief, which many say
has changed the British national psyche
forever. The Queen and Prince Charles
came under unaccustomed public criti-
cism, accused of not caring about
Diana's death.
Around 1 million people were on the
streets to see the funeral cortege on its
way to Westminster Abbey on Septem-
ber 6, and many watched it continue to
the Spencer family's estate at Althrop in
Northamptonshire, where Diana was bur-
ied. An award-winning exhibition at the
stately home displays Diana's wedding
dress and many childhood mementos.
Now there is a new generation: Prince
William gave Diana's sapphire and dia-
mond engagement ring to his fiancée,
Kate Middleton (now known as Cathe-
rine) when they became engaged on
November 16, 2010. They were married at
Westminster Abbey on April 29, 2011, in a
ceremony viewed by an estimated 2 bil-
lion people around the world. The public,
it seems, never tires of royal weddings.
