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Diana’s Legacy: A Reshaped Monarchy, a More Emotional U.K.

By Sarah Lyall

• Aug. 30, 2017

After the death of Diana , Princess of Wales, 20 years ago, London felt like a city on the verge of a revolution. Suddenly everything was up for grabs, even the monarchy itself. For a few crazy weeks, this most enduring of institutions looked as if it might actually implode under the weight of so much emotion.

For anyone there at the time, it was as electrifying as it was bewildering. The mood was febrile, angry, reckless. Flowers were piled knee-deep at the gates of the royal palaces; grown men wept openly in the streets; mild-mannered citizens inveighed against the usually blameless queen for what they believed was an inadequate response to a national crisis. Centuries of stiff-upper-lipped repression boiled over in a great howl of collective anguish.

Eventually the public regained its grip, and the monarchy — chastened and battered, but a monarchy nonetheless — endured. But as Britain on Thursday marks the 20th anniversary of Diana’s death with commemorations, documentaries and books, a central, if unlikely, piece of her legacy is how she reshaped the monarchy that rejected her, and how she reshaped Britain, too.

Diana in life was a loose cannon, an unpredictable wild card; in death, she had a galvanizing effect. Britain is already a very different place from Diana’s era, partly because of a younger generation less enamored with old conventions. But her death also opened a door, for better or worse, for the country to become more emotional and expressive, and more inclined to value gut feeling over expert opinion even in such matters as “Brexit,” its vote last year to leave the European Union.

Faced with a clear choice — modernize or die — the monarchy elected to modernize, led by Queen Elizabeth II but bolstered by a new generation of better-adjusted, better-prepared royals.

“The Windsors, whose most perilous moment came at Diana’s death, in fact owe their endurance to her example,” said Jonathan Freedland, a columnist for The Guardian, a left-leaning newspaper. “The queen is particularly alert to learning lessons from experience, and in this case the lesson was, ‘Don’t get on the wrong side of public opinion.’”

Diana was glamorous, magnetic, photogenic, mercurial, manipulative and intuitive; media victim and media perpetrator; the Real Princess of Kensington, a reality star before such a thing existed. If she is a less-defining figure to the generation that has grown up since her death, she still is an object of fascination for the generations who were stunned when she died two decades ago, at the age of 36.

“We gossip about her as if she had just left the room,” the novelist Hilary Mantel wrote recently in The Guardian.

And so the papers are full of snippets of “news” that have somehow managed to escape public disclosure until now.

A tourist from Ohio emerges from obscurity to claim he was in the tunnel in Paris at the time of the car accident that killed Diana; her boyfriend, Dodi al-Fayed; and their driver, Henri Paul. A Diana-watcher reports that the princess, her identity muted by a voluminous head scarf, regularly visited the grave of the police protection officer whom she loved and who died in what she believed was an “establishment plot,” but was really just a motorcycle accident. Diana’s “energy healer” reveals that she has heard from Diana recently (from beyond the grave) and that, in case you were wondering, the deceased princess is pro-Brexit.

“She was interested in the referendum and suggested I vote to leave because Britain was really great before the E.U.,” the healer, Simone Simmons, told The Daily Star .

Beyond these sorts of details, which help to keep the princess in the public consciousness and to sell tabloid papers, Diana’s influence is perhaps most evident in the evolution of the royal family.

During the days after her death, known now as Diana Week, a nation that had always appreciated the monarchy’s adherence to tradition was suddenly demanding that it tear up the old rules and learn new ones, right on the spot. “Show Us You Care,” The Daily Express said in its emblematic headline, imploring a staid queen, who had never once let down her guard in public, to address the nation and lower all her flags to half-staff, even as every fiber of her deeply conservative being militated against it.

Seriously shocked by what they encountered, the royal family had no choice but to respond.

“The times were changing, and they were not keeping up with the times,” Mr. Freedland said of the royal family. “But the truth is, they did manage to modernize.”.

As an example, Mr. Freedland pointed to the queen’s brief, witty appearance in a film for the opening ceremony of the 2012 London Olympics, in which she greeted the actor Daniel Craig in his guise as James Bond and then appeared to parachute with him into Olympic Stadium (the first part was real; the parachuting was done by a stuntwoman).

The new generation — namely Diana’s two sons, William and Harry, and William’s wife, Kate — has put a youthful, modern (at least by their standards) spin on what it means to be a royal person in 2017. They exude asexual wholesomeness (in the case of William and Kate) and bad-boy cheekiness (in the case of Harry), and give the appearance of working alongside, not in opposition of, public opinion.

They present as both curiously formal — Harry and William in their tailored suits; Kate in her dress-and-hat combos that make her look 20 years older; the royal children’s nanny in an amusingly old-fashioned uniform — and relatively normal, considering how not-normal their lives are.

Diana was considered disloyal and unhinged, an unguided missile, when she went on the BBC in 1995 to talk about her emotional distress. (“There were three of us in this marriage, so it was a bit crowded.”) In a sign of how much things have changed, William and Harry are marking the anniversary by speaking publicly about their mother — with royal approval.

Her death also marked a turning point in the history of Britons’ relationship to their own ids, ushering in an era in which people have new license to express themselves and feelings can weigh more heavily than reason, Mr. Freedland said.

“The reaction to her death is a preview of the Brexit landscape, in which emotion trumps expertise,” he said. “It was a shock to people — we didn’t think it was part of the British mind-set — and now, after Brexit, you can see there was something growing there, a willingness to give two fingers to the experts.” (Instead of using their middle fingers, Britons use what is known as a two-fingered salute.)

Public opinion polls suggest that nobody is particularly fond of Prince Charles, who at 68 is still waiting for his chance to become king. But they also show that the royal family, led by the seemingly indestructible 91-year-old queen, endures as a comforting unifying thread, providing a constitutional underpinning for a nation whose quirks include the fact that it has no written constitution.

“The royal family is key to our constitution,” Geordie Greig, editor of The Mail on Sunday, which publishes its share of royal-related articles, said in an email. “It provides a permanent and historical foundation going back more than 1,000 years.”

The pomp and circumstance of its spectacles — the weddings of Charles and Diana and of William and Kate; the funeral of Diana — unify the country “with a familial heartbeat that also resonates around the world,” he added.

At the very least, the royal family provides a gossipy distraction for a nation fretting about where it belongs and where it is going in this fraught era of Brexit. When is Harry going to propose to his girlfriend, Meghan Markle, and does it matter that she is American, describes herself as mixed race (and is an actress)? How disappointing is it that, at the age of 35, William has already lost much of his hair? How expensive was Kate’s sister’s very big, very fancy engagement ring?

Not everyone loves the royal family. Clearly anyone who visits Diana’s memorial fountain in Kensington Gardens is part of a self-selecting group, hardly a representative sample of public opinion. But a recent stop there showed how Diana, even after all this time, remains part of the conversation.

“I feel bad for Diana, the way they treated her,” said Kristina Landgraf, a German tourist. “She was a good person, she was kicked out of the royal family, and tried to have a personal life.”

Visitors to Buckingham Palace said that the royal family held a fascination, even for those who are not really a royal family sort of person.

“I’m more of a democracy type, and I don’t like that people rule a country because of their blood,” said Jochen Jansen, 22, also visiting from Germany. Yet he had come to the palace just the same: “I’m in London, and this is part of the culture of Great Britain,” he said. The conversation turned, inevitably, to Brexit.

“Also the queen and her husband might be nice people,” he said. “And I do hope they’re in favor of the E.U.”

An article on Thursday about the legacy of Diana, Princess of Wales, misstated the nationality of Meghan Markle, an actress who is dating Prince Harry. She is American, not Canadian.

How we handle corrections

Iliana Magra contributed reporting.

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Why Princess Diana Is So Hard to Get Right Onscreen

F or a brief time we knew her as Lady Di , and for a longer span as Princess Diana . But in the end, whether you loved or loathed what she stood for, no appellation felt adequate. By the time the former HRH the Princess of Wales died in a car crash in 1997, at age 36, she had become just Diana, one name with a complicated set of ambitions, joys and disappointments folded within its petals. You can adore her or decry her as a wily social climber. The one thing you can’t do is stop looking at her: 24 years after her death, her specter is finding life everywhere, on TV, in the movies and on Broadway. In our imaginations, at least, Diana is more alive than ever.

She is also more mysterious, an enigma worthy of exploration, something many of us didn’t feel about her 10 or 20 years ago. For a long time—the tragic nature of her death aside, a terrible fate for any human being—it was easy to take her for granted, even to roll your eyes at her a little. As a royal, she looked fantastic in clothes—but didn’t she also wear a pullover with little sheep knitted in, a fashion choice that, pre-grannycore, swerved a little too close to the jeering trend of the ugly Christmas sweater? And if the Diana story was in some ways incredibly sad—her Prince turned out to be a dud in the husband department, deeply in love with another woman the whole time—she was also canny enough to know how to play to her crowd. The “shy Di” Prince Charles first courted—a nursery-school helper with a habit of inclining her head such that her eyes were almost completely hidden by the blondish swoop of her bangs—later became a poised, polished young matron who publicly spilled royal secrets, avowing not-so-subtly that she had married into a family of monsters. Even if you had sympathy for her, the superstar-victim routine could be distasteful.

So how should we feel today about Diana? The buffet of choices is so large that she can be almost anyone we want. In 2016, Chilean filmmaker Pablo Larraín released Jackie , starring Natalie Portman , an intimate fantasy portrait of Jacqueline Kennedy . Now, with Spencer, Larraín attempts the same treatment for Diana, with Kristen Stewart as the tragic Princess.

Spencer takes place in December 1991, over a dismal Christmas holiday at Sandringham, the royal family’s country retreat, during which Diana decides to leave Prince Charles for good. But the movie feels less like a cry of the heart than a parody of a parody. Stewart’s Diana is so unpleasantly self-centered that she’d be a terrible guest at any Christmas affair. She’s late for every meal and complains, endlessly, that the family hates her and is trying to paint her as crazy. Meanwhile, she skulks about with her shoulders hitched to her ears, looking as if she’s about to pocket some of the royal silverware.

Read more: Kristen Stewart and Pablo Larraín Do Princess Diana Wrong in Spencer

A title card at the movie’s start informs us that Spencer is “A Fable from a True Tragedy,” and Larraín weaves in fairy-tale elements like so many threads of Lurex. Anne Boleyn makes a heavily symbolic appearance at the royal Christmas Eve dinner table, one unfortunate Queen blinking a warning to a woman who seems headed for a similar fate. Stewart, generally a marvelous actor, plays Diana as a mannered doe—the performance is packed with calculation and guile. Larraín may be trying to dive into the satin-and-sadness psyche of a misunderstood and persecuted woman. But he inadvertently turns this Diana into exactly the thing the royal family accused the real-life Diana of being: a willful and pouty complainer, or, worse, a megalomaniac. With friends like these, Diana doesn’t need enemies.

Spencer is heavily engineered to be one of those classy movies that wins awards. But the song-and-dance extravaganza Diana: The Musical is more like a work that Diana herself—known to be a fan of spectacles like The Phantom of the Opera —would warm to. The show—with music and lyrics by David Bryan and Joe DiPietro, and a book by DiPietro—was set to open on Broadway in spring 2020, before the pandemic brought the curtain down. The live show will finally go on as planned this November, but there’s a filmed version of the production available to watch right now, on Netflix.

Is Diana: The Musical any good? Not exactly. The early numbers, especially—during the part of the show that details the meeting and courtship of the young Diana and her Prince-to-be—are bright, cheerful and chirpy. The show’s star, Jeanna de Waal, bursts onto the stage with a peppy-Princess number about being underestimated, which just happens to be called “Under-estimated”: “Your prison has been built/ your downfall’s been devised/ Won’t they be surprised/ when you’re underestimated?”

The whole thing feels a bit self-helpy, cheerleaderish. But in a strange way, Diana: The Musical —an effervescently pro-Diana entertainment that also acknowledges how much the young Diana craved the spotlight, only to be burned by it—is a more honest work than Spencer. There’s nothing arty or arch about it; you can imagine Diana herself humming the songs, tickled to see her own reflection in them, and pleased as punch that she could inspire a Broadway show. Who wouldn’t like that kind of fame, rendered in a sweet, harmless form—especially Diana, who was first made famous by photographers and then, years later, almost literally hounded to death by them? A Broadway musical , even a silly one, isn’t the worst memorial for a woman who came to be known as the People’s Princess.

Read more: The Crown Doesn’t Fully Explain Why Princess Diana Was So Popular. Here’s How She Became a Global Celebrity

Yet of all these recent portrayals, it’s Emma Corrin’s, in the fourth season of Netflix’s fiction-based-on-fact drama The Crown , that comes closest to capturing Diana’s opalescent mystery. Corrin’s Diana first appears as a schoolgirl dressed as a tree sprite for a student production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Charles (Josh O’Connor) has come to the family home, Althorp, to pick up her older sister Sarah for a date; he spies the young Diana sneaking around in her tights, an awkwardly gamine adolescent who’s trying not to be seen—and yet clearly, desperately, wants to be seen, especially by a real-life Prince.

This scene is marvelous for the way it asks—without necessarily answering: Had Diana been scheming, from a young age , her way into the royal palace? And then comes the kicker: So what if she had? It’s common for young girls to yearn for fame, to dream of being acknowledged as charming and beautiful, to want to be seen. Corrin, so mischievous and flirty in those early scenes, helps us see that ambition in the very young Diana. But we also see how, just a few years later, that delight gives way to a particularly cruel disillusionment. In The Crown , days before the royal wedding, Diana discovers that her fiancé has recently designed a gold bracelet as a “farewell” gift for his not-really-an-ex, the married Camilla Parker Bowles. (Though The Crown is fictional, this anecdote is essentially factual.) The future Princess sees she has been betrayed; she wants to back out of the marriage , but it’s too late.

The Crown shows the stricken bride in that puffy merengue of a wedding dress. Corrin’s Diana looks so very small; as seen here, that dress—at the time a sigh-worthy symbol of fairy-tale fantasy—may as well be a white wolf eating her alive. Young Diana Spencer got the prize she thought she wanted, and when she realized how hollow it was, she reinvented herself to fit into her strange, unhappy surroundings—and then reinvented herself again to get out. No wonder we have no idea who she really was; she died on her way to becoming that person, leaving behind a jumble of puzzle pieces that will never be an easy fit.

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Princess Diana Changed the Idea of What a Princess Should Be

Decades after her tragic death, Lady Di's influence is still felt.

Lady Diana Spencer was only 20 years old when she married Prince Charles and became the United Kingdom’s own Princess of Wales. To the 750 million viewers who watched her 1981 wedding on television, Diana was a charming, down-to-earth princess who’d won her fairy tale marriage. But a decade later she sadly described the wedding as “the worst day of my life.”

Princess Di, as she was affectionately known, made that confession during a series of taped interviews with journalist Andrew Morton, who was writing a book about her life. She spoke candidly about her troubled marriage, her struggle with bulimia, and her difficulty handling life in the public eye. Most of the material has never been broadcast, but viewers can hear the interviews in the National Geographic documentary Diana: In Her Own Words .

The film came 20 years after Lady Di’s shocking death in a car crash. Although by that time she had divorced Charles, she remained an international icon and mother to two princes.

We spoke with Tom Jennings , executive producer of the new film, about the humanitarian causes Lady Di championed and how she changed the role of the royal family. ( See “Queen Elizabeth's Record-Breaking Reign in 14 Pictures.” )

How did the world react to the news of her sudden death?

When Princess Diana died, the whole world stopped. It was a remarkable and very sad series of events. The funeral was broadcast live around the world. People in the U.K. were putting flowers at the gates of Kensington Palace, so much so that for hundreds of yards you couldn’t even get to the palace gates.

Was the public always so infatuated with her?

People were fascinated by her to begin with. We grow up with this fairy tale fantasy of princes and princesses and castles, and all of sudden you had this very beautiful, very young woman living it. She almost instantaneously became more popular than Prince Charles. ( Read “Prince Charles's Newest Cause: Combating Ocean Trash.” )

Into the 1990s the pressures of her marriage started to weigh down on her. After Morton’s book came out, she became kind of a polarizing figure. Some people thought that a royal should not be talking in public about what’s going on in their private lives. But other people who believed in her and who truly loved her became even more staunch supporters of her.

Her humanitarian work was also divisive, particularly when she shook hands with AIDS patients in 1987 .

There was this unproven fear that if you just shook the hand of someone who had HIV or AIDS you would contract the disease, and Diana believed that not to be true. The people who loved her at that time loved her even more because here was a very public figure willing to show the world that these individuals need attention and care too. But some grumbled that a royal person shouldn’t be doing that. (See Remembering Diana: A Life in Photographs . )

Also during that time in the late ‘80s she took on homelessness, especially in the U.K. There’s footage of her going around and talking with people who are homeless, living in tents under bridges—and a lot of people just couldn’t believe it. She made a big point of saying that in the modern world people shouldn’t have to live like this. Right before she died, she took on the issue of landmines in war-torn countries in Africa, specifically Angola.

There was a conscious decision made on her part: ‘If I’m going to have cameras pointed at me the whole time, I might as well use all this publicity for good.’ And that’s what she did. She knew that her going out to hospitals or to fields filled with landmines would immediately draw the world’s attention to the problem. ( Read “Meet the Giant Rats That Are Sniffing out Landmines.” )

How did her humanitarian work and willingness to talk about her personal life change the royal family?

Princess Diana had a tremendous impact on the royal family, and the people of the U.K., and their opinions of what the royal family meant to them. I think it carries on most significantly with her two sons, the princes William and Harry. She even says in our film toward the end that she’s altering the monarchy in a subtle way—for especially William, the older of the two—by doing all of the things that she’s doing, by taking on causes that the royal family would not normally take on.

Some people give her a lot of credit for modernizing the royal family by making it more engaged. It certainly has taken on a much more modern spin, and that modern spin started with Princess Diana. No one else had changed it quite as much as she did before then. And I think it is seen now as a much more accessible British institution. The two princes are often out interacting with the public in a way that Diana did. She was never afraid to go and shake hands with people.

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.

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The Goddess and the Princess: Why Diana Endures

Twenty-five years have passed since the tragic death of Diana, Princess of Wales, yet pop culture and gossip mags continue to be fascinated by her life and legacy.

Twenty-five years after her untimely death, the legacy of Diana, Princess of Wales—more commonly known as Princess Diana—endures. For gender and cultural studies scholar Jane Caputi, who considered Diana’s iconic status in the years immediately following her death, the former royal’s image draws its power and longevity from mythology, specifically the parallels between the narratives of Diana, the goddess, and the life of Diana Spencer, the woman. Princess Diana’s popularity and power was “based in infinite background layers of older tales that infuse the surface narrative with memory, color, nuance, soul, and meta-morphic power,” writes Caputi.

The ancient goddess Diana evolved as a “folk” deity, seen as protector of the underclasses— the people’s goddess —a role that the public assigned to Diana Spencer as well. “Values associated with Princess Diana include compassion, love, and recognition of the primacy of the common people,” Caputi notes.

Then-Prime Minister Tony Blair posthumously dubbed Diana the “People’s princess” for her common touch. Rather than serving as an “icon of whiteness, privilege, race and class superiority,” Caputi argues, Diana herself saw her role as advocating for those “rejected by society,” with whom she felt an “affinity”: those diagnosed with AIDS, landmine victims, and homeless youth. Of course, it’s not mutually exclusive. Diana arguably was (and is) a symbol of white privilege and class superiority while simultaneously wielding an empathy that made others feel she was more “of the people” than “of the establishment.”

For those with less favorable opinions of Diana, there was the ancient construct of the Great Bitch (“The multiple teats/breasts of the Ephesian Diana refer to these origins,” explains Caputi). Hecate-Artemis (Diana) was depicted in the Ionian period as a “whelping Bitch,” and the word may have become a slur in Christian Europe because of its association with this destructive, vengeful goddess of wild animals.

Caputi shares the reaction of art historian Simon Schama to an interview with the Princess of Wales that was televised in 1995 as part of the BBC’s docuseries, Panorama . Schama explicitly evokes the mythological Diana in reference to the princess’s persona: “Treat her badly and she’ll treat you to a quiver full of arrows,” he suggests. Drawing on animal imagery, he characterizes Princess Diana as having “turned from desperate molting swan into bird of prey… an exterminating angel.”

“Such hyperbole reflects the threat that Diana posed in manifesting those most denied, feared, and potent aspects of archetypal female sacred power,” writes Caputi.

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Princess Diana’s brother, Charles, has also been instrumental in forging his late sister’s mythology. At her funeral, he emphasized the connection between goddess and princess, describing her as “the hunted, not the huntress.” The mythological was further concretized with the thirty-six oak trees, referencing the oak grove of Diana of Nemi in antiquity, that line the drive to Althorp, her childhood home and site of her burial. Her grave rests on an island, inaccessible to the public. Across from the island, a Doric temple displays Diana’s name and silhouette. Writes Caputi,

Pilgrims visit, bringing flowers, and written and sketched prayers and remembrances to a Diana whom we might recognize as an emerging deity, both ancient and new. Althorp is public only during the months of July and August, opening on the day of her birth and closing the day before her death. August may soon again be heralded as the sacred festival month of the Goddess Diana.

The “mytho-religious” behaviour around celebrity culture—worship and idolatry, ritual sacrifice and scapegoating—can show how mythic traditions are “antecedents of contemporary ideas.” Twenty-five years after an admittedly tragic death, a new kind of celebrity culture fueled by social media , a nostalgic pop culture, and recent tumultuous events in the British royal family have made Diana’s myth pertinent again: Diana as victim, Diana as victor, Diana as guardian angel, Diana as avenging angel. “It is myth, archetype, and icon that enable the expression of otherwise remote or ineffable concepts and emotions,” offers Caputi. The endurance of the myth of Diana perhaps also demonstrates how we still struggle to make sense of her life and death , and our reactions to both.

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Princess Diana’s Death

By: History.com Editors

Updated: November 13, 2023 | Original: August 3, 2017

Princess Diana —who married into British royalty, only to later be divorced from it—devoted herself to charitable causes and became a global icon before dying in a car accident in Paris in 1997. When she married Prince Charles in 1981, Lady Diana Spencer became the first Englishwoman to marry an heir to the throne in more than 300 years. Although their wedding was watched by millions worldwide, and their marriage produced two sons—both potential heirs to the throne—it is for her untimely death that Diana is perhaps best remembered.

Lady Diana Spencer: From Teacher to Princess

Diana was born on July 1, 1961, to Edward John Spencer and his wife Frances. At the time of her birth, in Britain’s peerage system, her father held the title of Viscount Althorp. Her parents were divorced in 1969, when she was eight, and her father won sole custody.

In 1975, when Diana was 14, her father inherited the title of Earl from his own father, who passed away that year. The title has been awarded since 1765, as the Spencers have been wealthy landowners in England for centuries.

Her family rented Park House, an estate owned by Queen Elizabeth II , Prince Charles’ mother. During Diana’s time as a child on the estate, she may have played with Charles’ younger brothers, Prince Andrew and Prince Edward. (Charles was 13 years older than Diana.)

Although she lost touch with him as a result of spending much of her youth attending prestigious boarding schools, Diana became re-acquainted with Prince Charles after moving to London to live and work in 1978. In the capital, she initially worked as a nanny before taking a job as a kindergarten teacher at the Young England School.

The courtship of Charles and Diana lasted several years before they were married at St. Paul’s Cathedral in London on July 29, 1981 . With the wedding, Diana was granted the title of Princess of Wales, as Charles’ official royal title was then the Prince of Wales. Charles ascended to the throne on September 8, 2022, after the death of his mother, Queen Elizabeth II.

Prince Charles and Princess Diana had two sons—Prince William in 1982 and Prince Henry (Harry) in 1984. Their marriage, however, was an unhappy one marked by extramarital affairs. In 1992, they announced their separation, and they divorced officially in 1996.

Princess Diana’s Humanitarian Causes

Diana, who had developed an interest in music and fashion as a child, quickly became a global icon of popular culture as she developed relationships with a number of entertainment personalities, including singers George Michael and Elton John .

She was also admired because she used her fame to raise public awareness—and charitable funds—for issues that mattered to her. As a former teacher, she was a lifelong advocate for children and supported efforts to abolish the use of land mines.

She also advocated for AIDS -related causes (she was the guest of honor at the opening of the United Kingdom’s first dedicated HIV/AIDS unit in 1987), and she is credited with helping to change the public’s perception of those who suffer from the disease.

She famously shook the hands of a patient with AIDS, in front of the media, without wearing gloves, dispelling the notion that the disease is transmitted via touch.

After her divorce from Prince Charles was finalized, Diana’s relationship with Egyptian film producer Dodi Al-Fayed , the son of a billionaire and former owner of London’s iconic Harrod’s department store and the city’s soccer team Fulham F.C. Dodi is perhaps best known as the producer of the film Chariots of Fire .

The couple’s relationship quickly became the subject of tabloid fodder, and they were routinely harassed by the paparazzi wherever they went.

Death of Princess Diana

On the evening of August 31, 1997 , Diana and Al-Fayed were dining privately in the Imperial Suite at Paris’ famous Ritz Hotel. They had planned to have a quiet, romantic meal at the hotel’s restaurant—Al-Fayed had reportedly purchased a ring for Diana earlier in the day—but they had to leave after 10 minutes because they were being disturbed by the press and other patrons.

At 11:30 that night, as they left the hotel to return to Al-Fayed’s Paris apartment, they were hounded by paparazzi, despite the fact that significant security precautions had been taken, including the use of a decoy vehicle, which left from the front of the hotel.

Diana and Al-Fayed left the hotel using a rear entrance, with French driver Henri Paul and one of the Princess’ bodyguards, Trevor Rees-Jones.

Driving a Mercedes S-280 limousine, Paul took Rees-Jones, Diana and Al-Fayed on a high-speed trip through the boulevards and narrow streets of central Paris. Investigators later estimated that the car may have been traveling in excess of 60 miles per hour.

At 12:19 a.m., the Mercedes carrying the couple, Paul and Rees-Jones, crashed into the 13th pillar of the Pont d’Alma Bridge, which traverses the River Seine. They were less than two miles from the Ritz Hotel.

Al-Fayed and Paul died at the scene. Diana was taken to Paris’ La Pitie Salpetriere Hospital, but several hours later, at 4 a.m., she died as a result of injuries she sustained in the crash, including a severed pulmonary vein. She was 36 years old.

The bodyguard, Rees-Jones, survived, despite suffering significant injuries. He recovered and returned to England, where he works in a family business and has published a book on his experiences with Diana.

Princess Diana’s Funeral

Princess Diana's death prompted an immediate—and unprecedented—outpouring of grief from all over the world.

Her funeral took place in London, five days after her death. An estimated 1 million people lined the funeral route from her London home in Kensington Palace to Westminster Abbey , where her funeral was held.

Diana is buried on a small island surrounded by a lake at Althorp, her family’s ancestral estate in Northamptonshire, England.

Investigating Princess Diana’s Death

Initially, the incident had been blamed on their French chauffeur, Henri Paul, who may have been exceeding the speed limit to avoid tabloid photographers.

A subsequent inquest on the crash performed by the British police, and released in 2006, ruled Diana’s death a “tragic accident.” The inquest found that Paul had been drunk at the time of the accident, and that his condition may have been worsened by prescription anti-depressants he was taking.

In fact, tests of Paul’s blood following the crash revealed that his alcohol levels were more than three times the legal limit in France for drunk driving. Investigators believe this caused him to lose control of the Mercedes.

The inquest jury ruled that both Paul and the paparazzi chasing Diana and Al-Fayed were responsible for the crash due to “gross negligence.” The deaths of Diana and Al-Fayed were also ruled “unlawful killings”—the court equivalent of manslaughter.

In addition, the jury ruled that the couple might have survived the crash had they been wearing seatbelts.

No one was charged in the deaths of Diana and Al-Fayed, as Paul was himself killed. Several members of the paparazzi were questioned immediately after the accident, but were released.

Diana’s Legacy

In addition to her accomplishments on behalf of those with HIV/AIDS while she was alive, Diana is fondly remembered as a patron of the United Kingdom’s National AIDS Trust, an advocacy organization for people with the disease and their families. Many of the organization’s initiatives are named in her honor.

Diana is also credited, by at least one biographer, with effectively modernizing the royal family in their relations with the British public.

Generally reserved, the royal family, and in particular Queen Elizabeth, have arguably been more engaged with the public since Diana’s passing, visiting with victims of terrorist attacks in London, for example.

Her sons William and Harry have also credited their late mother with shaping their own charitable efforts, which include HIV/AIDS and wildlife conservation work in Africa, among other initiatives.

Diana, Princess of Wales. The Home of the Royal Family. A Family History. Spencer of Althorp. How Princess Diana changed attitudes to Aids. BBC News. Diana death a ‘tragic accident.’ BBC News. Princess Diana’s Life and Legacy. ABC News.

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Princess Diana's 27 most memorable moments

Posted: May 19, 2024 | Last updated: May 19, 2024

Here are Princess Diana's most memorable moments from her inspirational life

So many things come to mind when we think of Princess Diana's best moments. From her unwavering compassion to her quick wit, there's no surprise that the Princess is remembered with such fondness.

It's her unwavering commitment to her philanthropic endeavours, rebellious nature and maternal instincts that left an impact on people. Despite her life being cut tragically short, there is no shortage of funny, admirable and impressive moments to remember her for.

These are the most memorable moments that defined the 'people's princess' - from her charity work to off-duty humorous moments.

When she helped break down the stigma around AIDS

In April 1987, Princess Diana opened the first purpose-built HIV/Aids unit in the UK. It was an important step at a time when so many patients with the illness were being treated with stigma and prejudice rather than with the help and compassion they needed. At the opening, she shook hands with an Aids patient - a radical move, when there was so much stigma around the disease and fears it could be transmitted through touch. She shook 12 men's hands without gloves, publicly challenging the widely-held misconception while demonstrating her support and compassion for the community.

When she danced with John Travolta

At an event hosted by Ronald and Nancy Reagan at the White House in 1985, movie star John Travolta asked Princess Diana for a dance. The songs playing were from two of Travolta's biggest movies, Grease and Saturday Night Fever .

Her revenge dress

A moment that will never be forgotten. The moment Princess Diana stepped out in the controversial dress, now more commonly known as The Revenge Dress, the same night as the news broke of Prince Charles's affair. Diana wore it in 1994 to a dinner at the Serpentine Gallery in Kensington Gardens.

When she walked across a minefield

During her visit to Huambo in 1997, Angola Princess Diana was photographed walking through an active landmine field wearing protective body armour and a visor. It was part of her promotional work for the charity Halo which was fighting against the legal use of landmines and Diana's work and this photo alone were instrumental in the global clearance of mines, particularly in the region.

When she raced against other parents at Prince Harry's sports day

Known for her hands-on parenting, Princess Diana never shied away from opportunities to have fun with her sons Prince Harry and Prince William and this moment is the perfect example of that. She is pictured running against five other mums in a parent's race at a sports day event.

When she collaborated with Andrew Morton on her book

First published as Diana: Her True Story in 1992, the book created a media storm and was said to have not come from Diana's own words but from those of her friends and family. However, shortly after her death, Norton revealed that Diana had helped him write the book, which was then republished as Diana: Her True Story in Her Own Words. This version, released in 2003, had Diana's input and proved that she authorised the biography.

Diana and Charles's engagement announcement

Charles and Diana's relationship was a tumultuous one. However, when the couple got engaged in 1981, they looked like love's young dream. The couple shared the happy news that they were to be betrothed through a statement via the Lord Chancellor. In their famous post-engagement interview, Charles said he was "delighted and frankly amazed" that Diana was prepared to take him on. Diana was 19 at the time and Charles 32. They were engaged for just five months before their iconic wedding at St. Paul's Cathedral.

Her 1995 Panorama interview

This is not only one of Princess Diana's most memorable moments but also one of broadcasting history's too. Titled An Interview with HRH The Princess of Wales, it was broadcast on the 20th of November 1995 on BBC1. Diana spoke about several hard-hitting topics, from the Royal Family's distaste for her to the struggles she'd faced after having her babies. The controversial interview was met with divisive opinions, with many arguing that Diana had been manipulated and tricked into revealing private information. However many of Princess Diana's most iconic quotes came out of this interview as she'd never been so honest about her life as a royal before.

Her 1981 wedding day

Taking place on the 29 July 1981, Charles and Diana's wedding was one of the biggest weddings of all time and around 750 million people watched it on television around the globe. It was largely regarded as the "wedding of the century" and Diana's dress is one of the all-time most iconic royal wedding dresses. It was also reported that Diana had a secret wedding dress that for some reason disappeared and was very different from the one she wore.

When she introduced baby Prince William

Prince William was the first royal ever to be born at a hospital in 1982 as the royal procedure had always been for the mother to have the baby at home. However, in true Diana style, she refused to do that. Instead, she had him at St. Mary's Hospital and introduced him to the world on the front steps.

When she rode the log flume with Prince Harry and Prince William

From taking them to McDonald's to demanding they go to school with other children, Princess Diana worked very hard to give her two boys as much of a normal childhood as possible. And that includes getting soaked on the log flume at Thorpe Park of course. It has since been revealed that young William was embarrassed by Princess Diana during their trip to the theme park.

When she sat alone outside the Taj Mahal

While on a royal tour of India with Prince Charles, Princess Diana took a solo trip to the Taj Mahal in 1992. Charles was attending a business meeting in Bangalore as she visited the palace - symbolic of enduring love - alone. The picture has become a historic one with many visitors reenacting it when visiting the palace.

When she danced with Wayne Sleep at the Royal Opera House

When Prince Charles and Princess Diana attended a gala performance at the Royal Opera House in 1985, Diana had a birthday surprise for Charles up her sleeve. Halfway through the performance, the Princess quietly slipped away and joined dancer Wayne Sleep on stage. They danced together to Billy Joel's "Uptown Girl", which Diana chose herself. Reportedly this surprise was meant to amuse Prince Charles - but his reception was cold.

When she brought baby William along for her first major overseas tour

For their very first royal tour together as a married couple, Prince Charles and Princess Diana visited Australia and New Zealand in 1983. By then they were parents to a baby Prince William. Ignoring the royal tradition to leave the children behind, Diana insisted they bring him along. Of course, he stayed with a nanny when the two were out completing royal duties, but it was an early sign of Diana's loving parenting style.

When she became the president of the Great Ormond Street Hospital

Princess Diana was the patroness of around 100 charities at the height of her royal duties as the Princess of Wales. From 1989 she became the President of Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children and remained so until she died in 1997. She would often visit the hospital to see the children and would attend charity events for the hospital.

When she refused to say "obey" in her wedding vows

By now we know that Princess Diana was not one for blind conformity and slight modification of her royal wedding vows is another example of this. Despite Queen Elizabeth insisting that it remain as part of her vows when marrying Prince Phillip, Diana omitted the line that said she would obey Prince Charles. Instead, she said she would, "love him, comfort him, honour and keep him, in sickness and in health." Princess Catherine and Meghan Markle are amongst the female royals who have upheld this omission.

When she was open about her post-partum depression and eating disorder

During her iconic Panorama interview, Princess Diana did not hold back and went into detail about her mental health struggles. She spoke about how troubled she became after having William, that it triggered a lot of insecurities in her and led to her developing an eating disorder. Many women came forward to show their admiration for Diana's public candour as it shone a light on the issue and normalised a taboo topic at the time.

When Time Magazine awarded her Woman of the Year for 1987

In 2020, Diana, Princess of Wales was named the Woman of the Year for 1987. In the retrospective Time Magazine's 100 Women of the Year list, she was awarded the Person of the Year title in 1987, because of her incredible work during the AIDS epidemic - de-stigmatising the illness, raising money for numerous charities and her unwavering support and allyship with the gay community.

When she auctioned off her clothes for charity

In the summer of 1997, Princess Diana decided, with some inspiration from a young Prince William, that she would auction off 79 of her most iconic dresses. The money raised was spread between several charities close to her heart, with the auction bringing in millions. She even sold the iconic revenge dress! Even decades later some of Princess Diana's most famed dresses were going up for auction and being sold for millions.

Her first public appearance with Charles

For her first official appearance as a couple, the then-Lady Diana and Prince Charles attended a 1981 gala evening at Goldsmith's Hall which was raising money for the Royal Opera House in London. The newly engaged couple looked very dapper in matching black tie attire.

Her first solo Royal engagement

In a festive celebration that also marked Queen Elizabeth II's 30th anniversary on the throne, Princess Diana was asked to turn on the iconic Regent Street Christmas lights in London. This was her first solo royal engagement, thousands watched on as she stood on the balcony at Austin Reeds and switched on beloved lights. She delivered a well-received speech and even re-emerged to wave at fans after the switch-on.

Her 36th and final birthday at the Tate

In true Diana fashion, Princess Diana celebrated her 36th birthday in style in 1997 by attending a gala held in her honour at the Tate Gallery's Centenary in London. She reportedly thoroughly enjoyed her evening and received an overwhelming amount of gifts and love from the crowds outside.

When she visited Harlem, New York

Another solo visit for the Princess, this time to New York City in 1989. Although the trip was primarily meant to promote the works of the Welsh National Opera, which she was a patron of, she visited several charities too. While there, she toured the Harlem Hospital Center where she became extremely moved seeing the patients there, so much so that she unexpectedly picked up and hugged a 7-year-old AIDS patient.

Her visit with Mother Teresa

When two compassionate and inspirational people meet, it doesn't come as a surprise that they would get along so well. They first met in 1992 and from that point continued to share a very special friendship, so much so that when Diana passed, the rosary necklace given to her by Mother Teresa was buried alongside her.

Her first solo trip to Nepal after the divorce

Following the official announcement of Prince Charles's and Diana's separation, the first trip she embarked on solo as a single woman was her 1993 official visit to Nepal. Here she visited a leprosy hospital where she met and chatted with patients. During her visit, she was her usual compassionate self and ended up being one of the first dignitaries the patients had ever touched.

Her final official engagement before her death

In July 1997, Princess Diana unknowingly attended her final official engagement at the Northwick Park Hospital in Harrow London. There she unveiled a foundation stone for the children's casualty department and accepted a donation for the hospital.

Her first official balcony appearance

Just one month before marrying Prince Charles, Princess Diana made her first official appearance on the Royal Balcony for her first Trooping the Colour ceremony. She stood alongside Charles and the rest of the royal family whilst they all looked out at the display.

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Princess Diana’s Iconic Portraits Come ‘Full Circle’ as Royal Photographers Show Images in London

Pictures of Kate Middleton, Prince William, Prince Harry and Meghan Markle are included in the show in London

John Nguyen/PA Media Assignments

Some iconic portraits of Princess Diana  have come home.

The pictures, including her famous moment in front of India’s Taj Mahal, are displayed along with the stories behind the photos in a new exhibition in London.

The show, which kicked off in three U.S. cities in 2023, and includes 75 life-size prints, has come to Diana’s home city to the delight of three photographers from one family.

Anwar Hussein took some of the most famous images of the late princess during a decades-long career as a photographer. His sons Samir and Zak have followed in his footsteps to take images of today’s royal family – with some of their favorite shots of Kate Middleton , Prince William , Prince Harry and Meghan Markle included in the show too.

The trio have collectively spent over four decades working side-by-side with the Princess and her family. Their show, Princess Diana: Accredited Access Exhibition  is an immersive, “walk-through" 60-minute experience and includes complimentary access to the audio guide.

“[London] is where Diana lived and so many of the iconic photos of Princess Diana were taken here," Samir – whose image of King Charles was issued by Buckingham Palace at his cancer announcement — tells PEOPLE. "From her wedding, to the births of William and Harry to key style moments such as the revenge dress.”

“We’re excited people in London can now hear the stories behind them. Seeing these photos displayed and celebrating her legacy will be extra special for all of us.”

“It really means a lot to all of the family to have our pictures on show [here]," adds Zak. "Although a global star, Diana does have a special place in the hearts of the British people and my dad is honestly so proud to have his amazing pictures of Diana displayed alongside mine and Sam’s pictures of the younger royals.” 

When the show opened in the U.S. Anwar told PEOPLE, "I saw every side of Diana. She was a genuine, good human being."

"You could see her go from Shy Di, looking down, to becoming stronger — which she had to do. She wanted to prove she was brave enough to do what she wanted.”

Samir adds, “We show how Diana’s humanitarian side has passed into her sons.”

“What works so well about the exhibition is that we’re able to juxtapose two generations of Diana and her sons and the photos my father took of Diana and us of the younger Royals.”

“Displaying and talking about historical events such as their royal weddings and children’s births side-by-side show how we have come full circle.”

Can't get enough of PEOPLE's Royals coverage?  Sign up for our newsletter  to get the latest updates on  Kate Middleton ,  Meghan Markle  and more!

Zak, who like Samir has taken pictures of the royals around the world, tells PEOPLE, "It really means a lot to all of the family to have our pictures on show in a city that was Diana’s home.”

“Whilst this exhibition celebrates the life of Diana through so many iconic pictures taken by my dad, I’m exciting to have the opportunity to showcase some of my favourite images of William and Kate, Harry and Meghan which adds another dimension to the experience."

Tickets, for the exhibition at St. Katherine's Dock, in London are available now .