Six most startling revelations in Prince Harry's Spare

Prince Harry's much-awaited autobiography, Spare, has opened to widespread criticism in the United Kingdom after a newspaper leaked a controversial portion of excerpts from it. The autobiography was slated to be released on the 10th of January but accidentally went on early sale in Spain this week. It set off British newspapers scrambling to get their hands on a copy, each of them frantically translating it to get hold of juicer bits of the book. And as its publisher promised it has already managed to stir up an extraordinary level of fascination, with newspaper front pages across the globe awash with headlines of Prince Harry’s sensational claims. 

Source: Official Instagram account of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex

A candid tell-all memoir, it makes startling revelations about Prince Harry’s life. The book will be the first insight into Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex’s life since he and his wife Meghan, Duchess of Sussex stepped down from their roles as senior royals. An unflinchingly raw take on his life, it roughly spans two decades of Prince Harry’s life. Much of the memoir is grounded in one of the most pivotal moments of his life, the death of his mother. The trauma of having to walk behind his mother, Princess Diana’s coffin at the tender age of twelve, without being able to privately grieve her death,  is reflected throughout the book. At the outset, it seems like Prince Harry’s act of putting pen to paper is a cathartic journey for him, but many commentators question his intentions given the book’s contentious claims. Jonathan Dimbleby, King Charles III’s official biographer has referred to Prince Harry’s revelations ‘as the kind you would expect from a B-list celebrity’.  

Source: Official Instagram account of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex

In this piece, we give our readers a lowdown on the most provocative claims that Prince Harry makes in his upcoming book. 

1. Turbulent relationship with brother Prince William: In numerous instances throughout the book, Prince Harry incessantly takes aim at his brother. In one of the most astonishing pieces of an excerpt, he claims that Prince William physically attacked during an argument they had over Prince Harry’s wife Meghan. He says Prince William called Meghan “difficult”, “rude” and “abrasive”, which Harry calls a “parrot[ing of] the press narrative” about his American wife. According to the excerpt, the situation quickly became tense, Harry narrates: ‘He grabbed me by the collar, ripping my necklace, and he knocked me to the floor. I landed on the dog’s bowl, which cracked under my back, the pieces cutting into me.’ 

2. The then-Prince Charles’ delight on having a spare: Prince Harry writes in his book about his father, King Charles' delight when his then-wife, Princess Diana, gave birth to a so-called ‘Spare’ in 1984. Prince Harry quotes his father’s words to his mother, ‘Wonderful! Now you’ve given me an heir and a spare—my work is done.’ Interestingly, one notes many instances in the book of Prince Harry’s resentment at being labelled a spare. In excerpts extracted from his memoir, the Duke of Sussex said that the press' nicknames for William and Harry – the Heir and the Spare – were also used by his parents, Charles and Diana, as well as the late Queen Elizabeth II and Duke of Edinburgh.

3. On his crusades during his time in Afghanistan: Prince Harry also details his experience as a helicopter pilot for the British Army in Afghanistan. This particular piece of excerpt has received near-universal criticism, especially in Britain owing to the unsettling questions it raises about the army’s sense of morality. The Duke of Sussex's unvarnished description of having killed 25 Taliban fighters in Afghanistan only seeing them as chess pieces to be taken off the board been termed inhumane. Several rebutted Prince Harry’s claim, with Ex-colonel Tim Collins commenting that was "not how you behave in the army". A Taliban official condemned his comments. Responding to the prince's comments, Taliban leader Anas Haqqani tweeted: "Mr Harry, The ones you killed were not chess pieces, they were humans; they had families who were waiting for their return…’. 

4. Queen Elizabeth’s death: Prince Harry in one section of his book that details his relationship with Queen Elizabeth writes that he came to know of her death only through BBC’s online news website. He believes none of his family members bothered to inform him. The Duke of Sussex also mentions that he got a phone call from his father, the then-Prince Charles, to say that the Queen's health was worsening.

5. On his controversial appearance in a Nazi uniform: In 2005, when Prince Harry had been barely twenty he made an ignorant decision of putting on a Nazi uniform with a swastika armband to a fancy dress party. Within days of this indecent a photograph of him in the costume was surreptitiously leaked to the press causing a worldwide furore. But he now claims that it was his brother William and his then-girlfriend Catherine’s encouragement that led him to do so. He claims he phoned William and Kate asking them if he should wear a pilot’s uniform or a Nazi one, and they said the latter. Both howled with laughter, he said, when he later tried it on for them. 

6. Chronicling his tumultuous private life: His willingness to openly write about intimate details of his late teens and early twenties is beyond astounding. He gives a glimpse into a period in his life when he had been addicted to illegal drugs like cocaine. Apart from these, he also documents his early sexual experiences.