A ‘poisoned’ birthday present for Letizia: face to face with King Juan Carlos

More than two and a half years later, Philip Y letizia They will again coincide in an official act with Don Juan Carlos I de Borbón and, curiously enough, also at a funeral, that of Queen Isabel. Previously it was that of the Infanta Pilar, sister of the emeritus. It is also the first time the faces of the outgoing monarch have been seen from exile in Abu Dhabi. A date that arouses much expectation and which was doubted until the last minute of last Monday. Previously, the UK’s formal invitation to the Spanish monarchy to attend the British monarch’s final farewell was known, but it was questionable whether Sofía de Grecia y Borbón’s husband would accept it.

Juan Carlos has it clear. He does not want to cause an absence from the mass farewell his nephew will have at Westminster Abbey on September 19. London takes to the streets to show affection and respect for the longest-running and most charismatic monarch. A large representation of Royal Houses is expected to travel to the British capital to sign another historic picture.

Once the presence of Don Juan Carlos I at the funeral is confirmed, it is time to analyze the consequences and hypotheses. One question at the moment is whether the Spanish royal family will pose together as before, with an image of unity and apparent normality. They will also sit in the same place, something that will depend on the condition the emeritus king is in. It must be remembered that the situation with Felipe VI’s father is a delicate one and that he has lived for years in the eye of the media hurricane and has seen his name controversially splashed in all the headlines because of his maneuvers, investigated by the Justice.

It is an issue that is not trivial as it is in the public domain that: the relationship between Letizia and her father-in-law is far from the best. Much has been said about it. One of the last times was in the documentary The Bourbons: A Royal Family, where it was expressed with gross candor that Juan Carlos “cannot stand” his son’s consort. Not only that, he was ashamed that his son had fallen in love with a taxi driver’s granddaughter, with no lineage, surname or blue blood and a nurse mother.

The expert journalist of the royal family, Carmen Enríquez, told a joke that spread in the circle of King Juan Carlos at the beginning of the courtship of Felipe and Letizia: “Prince Felipe’s friends were very chic before they met Letizia. were high society boys, her school friends were boys from large families. Letizia, it seems, had a habit of saying ‘jolines’ with some regularity. And some of those friends told us they called her ‘la jolines'” . Ultimately, what? Letizia was never to the liking of a king that he refused to accept that his daughter had fallen in love with a commoner.

Back to the present, interest grows as the date approaches to see Felipe and his wife’s behavior with King Juan Carlos. In case there was little curiosity, this is done face-to-face in the week in which Doña Letizia turns 50; the news is out two days before his day and it will be four days later when he again has to deal with his father-in-law in public. There will be no lack of cordiality and adherence to protocols from the outside, but inside it’s a different story.

The late English monarch’s ties to the Spanish family are explained by Elizabeth II being a cousin of Queen Sofia through the branch of Prince Philip of Edinburgh, of Greek descent. Yet there are more ties, as Juan Carlos’ paternal grandmother, Queen Victoria Eugenia, wife of Alfonso XIII, was the granddaughter of Queen Victoria of England, great-great-grandmother of Elizabeth II. Don Juan Carlos and Queen Isabella were fourth-degree cousins.