The book that was a bestseller in France, and convinced the anti-royalist
French to love the Queen.By the author of 1000 Years of Annoying the
French, A Year in the Merde and How the French Won Waterloo, or Think
They Did.The Sex Pistols famously sang that the Queen ain't no human
being. And seeing her frowning beneath the weight (1.9kg) of her crown and
ceremonial robes, you might believe it. But in fact, Elizabeth II has a
sharp sense of humour that she deploys even at moments of great ceremony.
Back in 1953, as she entered Westminster Abbey for her coronation to begin,
she told the Archbishop of Canterbury give me a push to get me started.
When she welcomed French President Sarkozy to Windsor Castle in 2008, she
met him in a carriage pulled by horses called Agincourt and Zut Alors. And
to read out the government's speech announcing Brexit in 2017, she wore a
royal blue hat decorated with yellow-centred flowers - the colours of the
European Union flag. Behind the severe façade, there is clearly something
wickedly witty going on. This book is a compilation of anecdotes about the
Queen and her family (including that champion of the royal gaffe, Prince
Philip), detailing all the quips, tricks and practical jokes that lighten
their otherwise heavily formal lives. As the Queen herself once said when
asked about her garish outfits: If I wore beige, no one would see me.