"The Way We Were: Remembering Diana" by Paul Burrell (2006)


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I think the relationship between Diana and Paul Burrell was not right and as with any relationship like that, the two probably they took turns taking advantage of one another. I've heard too many times that Diana monopolized her friends and servants to believe that Burrell is making that part up.

If Diana did blur the lines between employee and confidante, then I think it was unfair towards an employee who was in a subservient position who couldn't easily say no. And like any employee being taken advantage of, Burrell probably got even with her in many small ways while she was alive and now by selling her secrets now that she's dead.

Its why I always tried to treat people working in my house with respect, you need to be able to trust someone that has the keys to your front door and its chancy having to trust someone that you're taking advantage of. And then if they don't deserve respect even when I'm being considerate, then I don't want them in my house. Its a matter of trust.
 
ysbel said:
I think the relationship between Diana and Paul Burrell was not right and as with any relationship like that, the two probably they took turns taking advantage of one another. I've heard too many times that Diana monopolized her friends and servants to believe that Burrell is making that part up.

If Diana did blur the lines between employee and confidante, then I think it was unfair towards an employee who was in a subservient position who couldn't easily say no. And like any employee being taken advantage of, Burrell probably got even with her in many small ways while she was alive and now by selling her secrets now that she's dead.

Its why I always tried to treat people working in my house with respect, you need to be able to trust someone that has the keys to your front door and its chancy having to trust someone that you're taking advantage of. And then if they don't deserve respect even when I'm being considerate, then I don't want them in my house. Its a matter of trust.
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you're definitely right about both taking advantage of the other and that you have to trust people in those positions. i also agree with your statement about respect...very very important. i guess what i have a problem with is the fact that when he began working for the royals and diana he knew he'd be in a position of strict confidentiality, as is anyone working for the royals. as in any job if you feel you're being taken advantage of you always have the right to leave. having said that, i realize that if you do you run the risk of having to settle for a far less illustrious (for lack of a better word) job but respect works both ways...diana took advantage because she could...he allowed her to do it whether it was because he thought he could tuck it way for future reference or not. in doing so, he took advantage in the same way. i strongly believe he knew one day he would write a book and took advantage of every opportunity to ensure that he would have lots to tell.
 
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Oh believe me, Duchess, I'm not excusing Paul Burrell in the least. But by the same token, I don't think Diana was totally ignorant of Paul's character when she was alive either. And yet she kept him in her employ even though he was taking advantage of her. I don't for one minute think that Paul just started taking advantage of her when she died. It probably started before then and she was probably aware of it.

Remember, he was the only staff member to accompany her on one of the last extended overseas missions she took after the divorce (I think it was Africa or India) Its very hard to hide one's true character in a situation like that. She had to have known something was up and its hard for me to believe that she wasn't aware that he was virtually abandoning his wife and children to spend time with her.

So in short, I think it was a sick relationship and both were guilty of taking advantage and letting themselves be taken advantage of. But I'm not so judgmental about the situation as it first appears:

I think for people that are used to abusive situations, the weird dynamics of their relationship would have felt entirely normal. I think Paul Burrell probably let Diana take advantage of him for the same reasons that Diana let Paul take advantage of her-it felt normal. I was in an abusive work situation and it felt entirely normal till I quit the job for unrelated reasons and found a position where the atmosphere was a lot saner.

Diana's own insecurities and willingness to stay in abusive situations is easier to recognize because we know more of her traumatic childhood- first being torn between her parents during their nasty divorce and the nasty games the kids including Diana would sneak and play on their stepmother like putting pins in her chair. Then when they were adults, Diana had a dysfunctional relationship with her brothers and sisters as well as a distant relationship with her mother. Diana had problems with healthy relationships.

We don't know too much about Paul's past but if he's like anyone else in this situation he probably has his own history too.

It always amazes me how long these situations last and what bothers me most about Diana is that she kept getting into these messes. James Hewitt was another one who took advantage. If she had gotten fooled one time, I could see where it would have been an honest mistake that could have happened to anyone but the number of times she associated with and got burned by people who were just sleazy makes you wonder how healthy her relations with others generally were.
 
ysbel said:
Remember, he was the only staff member to accompany her on one of the last extended overseas missions she took after the divorce (I think it was Africa or India).
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It was a trip to Bosnia in August of 1997, squeezed in between her vacations with the Fayeds.

After watching a video of Burrell's intereview on with ABC/Good Morning America, I do find him more sympathetic than what the media has made him out to be. As with a lot of abusive relationships, one has to be away from it for some time before recognizing how damaging that relationship was. Nine years may be long for most people, but it is obviously still fresh in his mind's eye.

Of all the people involved, I feel sorry for his two sons the most. I always wonder why Maria Burrell never took the children and left him, given how upset she was with his devotion to Diana. He even wrote about her reactions in his earlier book.
 
I read a majority of your opinions and i respect them but I think Paul Burrell and Princess Diana had a strange but loving relationship. Diana I believe entrusted Paul with too much of her secrets, and Paul put Diana before his family way too many times. But still I think Paul loved Diana very much. After she died he was the one that dressed Diana's body for her last journey to England. I don't find him as a bad person but as a strange man.
 
ysbel said:
It always amazes me how long these situations last and what bothers me most about Diana is that she kept getting into these messes. James Hewitt was another one who took advantage. If she had gotten fooled one time, I could see where it would have been an honest mistake that could have happened to anyone but the number of times she associated with and got burned by people who were just sleazy makes you wonder how healthy her relations with others generally were.
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Okay, but to be fair, how often did she actually get burned? Yes, she should have learned from James Hewitt-but how many others sold her out during her lifetime? Simone Simmons, Paul Burrell, Ken Wharfe, Patrick Jephson-their revelations came AFTER her death. Oliver Hoare, Hasnat Khan, James Gilbey, Christopher Whalley, Teddy Forstmann, even Will Carling-all supposed lovers who have never spoken to the press, before her death or since. And there were any number of trusted employees who have never done so, either. Even Andrew Morton didn't confirm that Diana aided him with his book until after her passing.

The selling out of Diana, really, came after her death.
 
sirhon11234 said:
After she died he was the one that dressed Diana's body for her last journey to England. I don't find him as a bad person but as a strange man.
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I find it a little hard to believe that Burrell was allowed to dress Dianas' body for the journey home, that would have been done by mortuary attendants, a ladies maid or a female of some sort, not a butler! :ermm:

That would have been totally beyond the bounds of propriety, IMO.
 
Skydragon said:
I find it a little hard to believe that Burrell was allowed to dress Dianas' body for the journey home, that would have been done by mortuary attendants, a ladies maid or a female of some sort, not a butler! :ermm:

That would have been totally beyond the bounds of propriety, IMO.
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He never said that he dressed her body-just that he picked out a dress for her to wear. Everyone there that day has said that, yes, she was dressed by mortuary attendants, who also did her hair and makeup, and moved her to the casket. I agree, I can't imagine that the hospital staff would have allowed anyone but the morticians to do that job. The hospital did, after all, have legal responsbility until Diana left, and would have been held liable for anything untoward, so they would have adhered strictly to the rules for such things.
 
As I said in my podcast, don't buy the book. There's no reason for him writing this other than to build a nice new conservatory. This man obviously doesn't care about Diana, he's just using what he saw to make a quick buck. If you don't buy the book, it gets pulped and he wont write another one.
 
ysbel said:
Oh believe me, Duchess, I'm not excusing Paul Burrell in the least. But by the same token, I don't think Diana was totally ignorant of Paul's character when she was alive either. And yet she kept him in her employ even though he was taking advantage of her. I don't for one minute think that Paul just started taking advantage of her when she died. It probably started before then and she was probably aware of it.

Remember, he was the only staff member to accompany her on one of the last extended overseas missions she took after the divorce (I think it was Africa or India) Its very hard to hide one's true character in a situation like that. She had to have known something was up and its hard for me to believe that she wasn't aware that he was virtually abandoning his wife and children to spend time with her.

So in short, I think it was a sick relationship and both were guilty of taking advantage and letting themselves be taken advantage of. But I'm not so judgmental about the situation as it first appears:

I think for people that are used to abusive situations, the weird dynamics of their relationship would have felt entirely normal. I think Paul Burrell probably let Diana take advantage of him for the same reasons that Diana let Paul take advantage of her-it felt normal. I was in an abusive work situation and it felt entirely normal till I quit the job for unrelated reasons and found a position where the atmosphere was a lot saner.

Diana's own insecurities and willingness to stay in abusive situations is easier to recognize because we know more of her traumatic childhood- first being torn between her parents during their nasty divorce and the nasty games the kids including Diana would sneak and play on their stepmother like putting pins in her chair. Then when they were adults, Diana had a dysfunctional relationship with her brothers and sisters as well as a distant relationship with her mother. Diana had problems with healthy relationships.

We don't know too much about Paul's past but if he's like anyone else in this situation he probably has his own history too.

It always amazes me how long these situations last and what bothers me most about Diana is that she kept getting into these messes. James Hewitt was another one who took advantage. If she had gotten fooled one time, I could see where it would have been an honest mistake that could have happened to anyone but the number of times she associated with and got burned by people who were just sleazy makes you wonder how healthy her relations with others generally were.
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so well put yzbel and i totally agree. sometimes people in abusive relationships feed off each other...i hope i don't insult or hurt anyone by saying that but i think you know what i mean. both benefited in one way or another from each other.
 
I think they were both needy people who needed each other, and sometimes that's just not healthy. His family certainly paid the price during the time he worked for Diana, and then later during his legal troubles.
 
sassie said:
He never said that he dressed her body-just that he picked out a dress for her to wear. Everyone there that day has said that, yes, she was dressed by mortuary attendants, who also did her hair and makeup, and moved her to the casket. I agree, I can't imagine that the hospital staff would have allowed anyone but the morticians to do that job. The hospital did, after all, have legal responsbility until Diana left, and would have been held liable for anything untoward, so they would have adhered strictly to the rules for such things.
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Thank you for the clarification. :flowers: I was replying to sirhon11234 who said "After she died he was the one that dressed Diana's body for her last journey to England".
I never read Burrells book and I try not to watch the ghastly little oik on the tv (unless they have set him up in some way), so I wouldn't know if this was a claim he made or not. I wouldn't put anything past him! :rolleyes:
 
I think he is a sad and sick individual who is just another pathetic human trying to cash in on his royal ties.
 
I read Paul Burrell's book last night (I read his first so thought I may as well read his second), and I have to say that I didn't really get much out of it. I didn't buy it, rather a colleague at work had recently finished and offered it for a read.

I found him really repetative and being someone who isn't all that fond of repetition, I thought that unfortunate and a real flaw of the book.

I dont know him so cannot take shots at his character or morals but to cash in one someones memory (whoever it may be), is something I think to be so sad. As an employee, its 'probably' not uncommon to devulge intimate stories about your employers if you have been privy to them, but as a 'friend', his duty was to honour those conversations and her trust.

I was also taken aback by Paul's admissions that he had infact told a couple of white lies in his first book as it wasn't the appropriate time to state the truth. When you write a book and if you want to be taken with some credability, you have to be honest without hesitation.

On the last page, Paul says this is the final book he shall write about Diana, Princess of Wales and that he did so in the first place for the 10 year anniversary of her passing. I hope his telling the truth this time!
 
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Elspeth said:
Our local bookstore said the first one didn't sell as well as expected; apparently even with the more lurid revelations he still can't get people to bite. I hope Sarah Bradford's book is doing a lot better than this one.
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Personally, I think people are getting a bit tired of the "lurid revelations". A glimpse behind the scenes is always interesting-but I think the glut of such revelations about Diana since her death is starting to offend even the most cynical person's sense of fair play and privacy.

Perhaps Sarah Bradford's book is selling better because it is more balanced, and puts more focus on Diana as a flawed but remarkable person, rather than relying on tittle tattle and gossip.
 
sassie said:
Perhaps Sarah Bradford's book is selling better because it is more balanced, and puts more focus on Diana as a flawed but remarkable person, rather than relying on tittle tattle and gossip.
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I found this review of the Bradford-book and found its critizism worth thinking about:

http://www.nysun.com/article/41294.

The critic states that eg
"To maintain a view of Diana in charge, Ms. Bradford describes a princess who could be brutal with her staff and with others devious, manipulative, and suspicious. Call Ms. Bradford's effort an overcorrection. Seeking to avoid the sentimentality, the wallowing in victimhood, and the crass psychologizing of earlier biographies, the biographer chooses to create a proactive Diana.
But Ms. Bradford seems almost willful in disregarding evidence that weakens her brief. For example, she attributes much of the talk of Diana's mental illness to her enemies at court."

She has other valuable points of critizism, so I believe the article is worth reading.
 
Thank you, Jo, for that link. I found it a very interesting read.
 
Well, it was an interesting read for some parts. Like how Diana handled fanmail! and the pictures of her dressing table. Very nice.
 
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