London: Britain’s Prince Harry has said he only cried once after the death of his mother, and has described feelings of guilt in one of a series of interviews ahead of the publication of his memoir.
In a clip from “Harry: The Interview,” which was aired on Sunday, Harry speaks about being unable to show any emotion when meeting mourners following the death of his mother, Diana, princess of Wales, in 1997.
He also admits to feeling “some guilt” when walking among the gathered crowds outside Kensington Palace, saying the only time he cried was at his mother’s burial.
He tells presenter Tom Bradby: “Everyone knows where they were and what they were doing the night my mother died.
“I cried once, at the burial, and you know I go into detail about how strange it was and how actually there was some guilt that I felt, and I think William felt as well, by walking around the outside of Kensington Palace.” Harry describes feeling the mourners’ tears on his hands when he shook them.
“There were 50,000 bouquets of flowers to our mother and there we were shaking people’s hands, smiling,” he says.
“I’ve seen the videos, right, I looked back over it all. And the wet hands that we were shaking, we couldn’t understand why their hands were wet, but it was all the tears that they were wiping away.
“Everyone thought and felt like they knew our mum, and the two closest people to her, the two most loved people by her, were unable to show any emotion in that moment.” The interview is the first of four broadcast appearances over the coming days, with Harry also speaking to Anderson Cooper for “60Minutes” on CBS News on Sunday, Michael Strahan of “Good Morning America” on Monday and Stephen Colbert on the “Late Show” on CBS on Tuesday.
A string of revelations have already been leaked from the memoir,”Spare,” which is due to be published on Tuesday.
Harry says in the book he thinks that he is unable to cry in public because of his family’s preference for not showing emotion.
According to the Telegraph, Harry writes: “I disliked the touch of those hands. What’s more, I disliked how they made me feel: guilty.
“Why was there all that crying from people when I neither cried nor had cried? “I wanted to cry, and I had tried, because my mother’s life had been so sad ... but I couldn’t ... not a drop.
“Perhaps I had learnt too well, had absorbed too thoroughly the family maxim that crying was never an option — never.” — dpa
Oman Observer is now on the WhatsApp channel. Click here
