According to a new Prince Charles biography, written by someone who claims to have inside info on the royals, Clarence House, where the future King of England resides, has been dubbed “Wolf Hall” due to a large amount of staff infighting and strife.
Time Magazine’s Catherine Mayer, who wrote the biography Charles: Heart of a King , claims that time-honored bitter rivalries plague the household, which have led to the collapse of a multimillion-dollar deal to combine all of the prince’s charities under one roof.
The book, which is serialized in the Times newspaper, talks about what life at Clarence House is allegedly like, as per a fictionalized account by Hilary Mantel.
“One former householder refers to Clarence House as Wolf Hall, in reference to the treacherous and opportunistic world depicted by Hilary Mantel in her fictionalised account of the rise of Thomas Cromwell under Henry VIII,” writes Mayer.
Adding, “Apart from his time in the Navy, he has never held a paying job and doesn’t understand the anxiety such moves can create. No student of management theory, he believes rivalries promote better performance, rather than recognising the glitches and strains which territorial disputes can cause.”
One example of how the household is divided is the failed plan to house Prince Charles’ charities under one roof in redeveloped railway sheds at King’s Cross in London.
Mayer claims, “Sources say internal conflicts scuppered the scheme after it was already significantly advanced, wasting money instead of saving it.”
The official line from Clarence House is that the biography is totally unauthorized and that the author has no inside access to Prince Charles or any other royal sources.
Despite that, Mayer claims she met the prince and his aides at least once while researching her book.
“Far from itching to assume the crown, he is already feeling its weight and worrying about its impact on the job he has been doing,” she writes.
The prince’s spokesperson told reporters, “Speculation about what sort of king the Prince of Wales will make has been around for many, many years and the Household and the Prince have never commented on this and neither will they do so now.”
