Dominick Dunne: A Tribute

A beautiful memorial to Dominick Dunne is offered at Vanity Fair
Leave your condolences here.

Wikipedia

The Return of the Old Etonian

Article by Christopher Hitchens, which Sloane Rangers will surely find riveting.
There are a number of reasons why America does not have an Eton. In order to evolve such a school, you have to start with a monarchical foundation in the mid-15th century. (King Henry VI simultaneously founded King’s College, Cambridge.) A few hundred years of feudalism and empire are then required, during which time 18 of the country’s prime ministers attend the school, as do countless generals, ambassadors, and colonial governors. A vivid legend of the three B’s—bullying, beating, and buggery—must spring up, imprinting itself thoroughly on the formative years of a ruling caste. The national poetry must show the school’s influence, from Thomas Gray to Shelley to Swinburne. Eton is not just where George Orwell went to school, there to be taught by Aldous Huxley, so that the future authors of 1984 and Brave New World could be in the same classroom. It is where Evelyn Waugh sends Sebastian Flyte and Anthony Blanche, the two most flamboyant figures of Brideshead Revisited. It is where J. M. Barrie sends Captain Hook. It is where P. G. Wodehouse sends Bertie Wooster and Psmith. It is where Anthony Powell, another Etonian, sends Nick Jenkins, the narrator of A Dance to the Music of Time. It is where Ian Fleming sends James Bond (expelled, unusually enough, for heterosexuality). It is where John le Carré evolved the concept of the honorable schoolboy.
It’s impossible to overstate the effect that the Eton mystique can exert on the most improbable people. All through the spring and summer of this year, a capacity crowd went every night to the National Theatre to see Jeremy Irons playing an elder statesman in Howard Brenton’s Never So Good. Brenton is a renowned ultra-leftist, but his moving play, which is about the life and times of the Tory prime minister Harold Macmillan, is unashamedly evocative of the double-distilled Eton legend.

Will's Cup of Tea

Image from the Vanity Fair article, with thanks.

Will’s Cup of Tea
For more than four years, Kate Middleton has navigated the perilous waters of being Prince William’s girlfriend, handling the snobbery, sniping, and spotlight without official support or guidance. As Britain’s odds-makers bet on a wedding, the author takes a look at the bonds—and the breakup—that cemented Middleton’s place in both the Prince’s heart and the Palace fold.

Read the article here and view a slideshow of Kate Middleton fashion photos here.

Vanity Fair: Two Ladies, Two Yachts, and a Billionaire

Image: Hon. Diana Spencer and her sister, in Paris, as jeunes filles.

Did you believe that the Princess of Wales was in love with Dodi al Fayed? Read this excerpt from Dominick Dunne's VANITY FAIR article:
"The more I hear and read and think about Diana’s and Dodi’s deaths in the Pont d’Alma tunnel, in Paris, on August 31, 1997, in what is possibly the world’s most famous car crash, the more I doubt the truth of their great romance. If it was anything at all, it was a flirt, a fling, “just one of those things,” as Cole Porter once wrote. Like the conspiracy theory surrounding their deaths, their romance, too, was orchestrated by Mohamed Al Fayed. The shrine to the eternal love of Dodi and Diana, in Harrods, the most famous of English department stores, owned by Al Fayed, is a popular tourist attraction. People line up to look at it. They speak in whispers, as if they were in church, instead of next to the Egyptian escalator in the basement of the store. The shrine, which is tacky but curiously touching, consists of a fountain, two large portraits—one of Dodi and one of Diana—and floor-lamp-size candles, the scent of lilies in the air. Under a glass pyramid is a crystal glass from which one of them had drunk champagne in the Imperial Suite of the Ritz Hotel just before they died, and the so-called engagement ring, which Dodi had bought that afternoon at the jewelry shop down the street from the Ritz. Diana never wore it. They had been romantically involved with each other for less than a month."
Read the rest of Dominick Dunne's article here.