Breaking Or Remaking? – Significance Of The Royal Wedding

By Shyamon Jayasinghe –MAY 20, 2018

Shyamon Jayasinghe

Break or Remake?

The Royal Wedding we saw recently, carries levels of meaning. Not the least is that it exhibited an inherent flexibility of a public social and political instrument- in this case the Royal Monarchy. Perhaps, the monarchy had learnt lessons from the tragic death of Diana. But  being ready to learn is itself demonstrative of the quality of suppleness. In confronting an external threat to its known way of life, the British Monarchy had two options: one was to let it break asunder; the other was stop it from breaking by absorbing the threatening factor, person or force. The second option keeps the institution strong by allowing for variety and readiness to face future “indiscretions.”

 This is what the British Monarchy did when the proposal of Prince Harry came up. Meghan Markles was American;she was half-black; she is a divorcee; she had been a movie actress and her social backround had not been elite at all. However, the British royalty said “yes.” Maybe after attempts at persuasion; but they approved and got ready for the event. To me, the most warming incident of the marriage ceremony was when Prince Charles walked Meghan down the aisle in circumstances where her father could not turn up. The graceful venerable Prince, who resignatedly played a whole life as second fiddle to his Royal partner Majesty the Queen, once again undertook to chaperone Meghan in Royal humility.

I had an interesting online message from a friend who presented an imaginary dialogue of a stereotyped encounter that would hypothetically take place in a standard Sri Lankan Sinhala family in situations of external threats to ‘marital purity and honour.’ I reproduce it for the reader not merely for the latter’s entertainment but as a demonstrative illustration of how Sri Lankan families face social threats from contradictions of this sort. Here it is:

Mother to young daughter (subject of the proposal): “ You will do this marriage only on my death bed…. you understand?”

Father: You are ruining our good name and honour. You have tarnished our face with black, kitchen soot.”

Other Relatives: “ Sure way to spoil our kids, too. Our race is finished!”

The imaginary dialogue suggests that the Meghan lesson can be useful learning for ordinary folk in their daily lives-wherever we may live. Are you going to break or are you going to remake?

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