A Cinderella Story – According to Earl Spencer

By Aman Sethi

A.P. English Language

Mr. Bryan Powles
27th September, 2009
 Aman Sethi
A.P. English
Mr. Powles
27th September, 2009

The passing of a great person is often treated with great ceremony and pomp,

and the eulogies given at the funeral of these people often have double meanings.

They are not only used to remember the people who have just died, but these eulogies

are also used as a medium to address a large number of people. At the state funeral

service for Diana Spencer, Princess of Wales, her eulogy was given by her brother,

Charles Spencer, Earl of Spencer, on the sixth of September, 1997. At the funeral,

which was broadcasted live around the world, Spencer spoke at length on his sister’s

attributes, as well as on her vulnerabilities. In his eulogy, Spencer presents Diana as a

multi-faceted individual, an insecure and vulnerable human being, but at the same

time he portrays her as a sort of perfect, fairy-tail princess. Through his use of

language, Spencer’s image of the perfect being is impressed stronger in the reader or

listeners mind than the image of the insecure and vulnerable girl. To accomplish this,

Spencer uses several literary and rhetorical devices, such as irony, paradox, asyndeton

and others, leaving the image of Diana as a saintly figure in the listeners mind.

Earl Spencer, in his eulogy often presents Diana as not just a great individual,

but as a normal human being, and all the faults that it implies. This can be seen in

several parts of the eulogy, for example, Spencer says in his eulogy “Diana remained

throughout a very insecure person at heart, almost childlike in her desire to do good

for others so she could release herself from deep feelings of unworthiness,” This

statement is highly ironic, and this irony helps people relate with Diana, as someone

who is nice and selfless, but is so for selfish reasons. Another line that displays

Diana’s humanity is when Spencer describes Diana’s childhood - “big sister who

mothered me as a baby, fought with me at school, and endured those long train

journeys between our parents' homes with me at weekends.” This line portrays Diana

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 Aman Sethi
A.P. English
Mr. Powles
27th September, 2009

as a normal person, imperfect, who behaves like all people in some situations. This

line also places Diana in a relatively normal situation in her childhood – school,

arguments with family, divorced parents. This makes Diana seem like a victim of

circumstance, and the listener is attracted to this vulnerability. It is this that allows the

listener to relate to Diana, who otherwise in Spencer’s eulogy would have become too

alien for the listeners to understand. With Spencer portraying Diana with some human

aspects, the listeners gain a common ground with Diana, which allows them to relate

to her.

Diana is portrayed as not only a woman, but as something much greater by

Spencer in his eulogy, almost like a perfect being form a fairy – tale. This can be

shown in the line “Diana was the very essence of compassion, of duty, of style, of

beauty.” The use of asyndeton and the lyrical syntax of this sentence have several

effects. The lack of conjunctions in this line helps to emphasize the positive attributes

Spencer is giving to Diana, while the lyrical syntax makes the line sound poetic, and

this underlies and promotes the decency and goodness the diction in this line

represents. This image is also displayed in the line “she was a symbol of selfless

humanity, a standard-bearer for the rights of the truly downtrodden, a very British girl

who -- who transcended nationality, someone with a natural nobility who was

classless,” which has several effects on a listener. This line does several things at

once, for one, in this line, Spencer alludes to folk-tale literature, such as the Cinderella

story and presents Diana as a version of Cinderella, but as one for whom the story

takes place in reverse. This is reinforced in the line “she was looking for a new

direction in her life,” which Spencer indicates was the time after her divorce. In

addition, the quote also has paradoxical diction, and this presents Diana has

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 Aman Sethi
A.P. English
Mr. Powles
27th September, 2009

something more than human, and portrays her as a being capable of the impossible.

This portrayal makes Diana seem detached from the normal world, and leaves the

listener with feelings of awe and wonder.

Though in Diana’s eulogy, Spencer presents two contrasting images of Diana,

ultimately, through Spencer’s use of language, it is the image of the perfect, greater

than human being that remains implanted in the readers mind. This can be seen in the

somewhat paradoxical statement “There is a temptation to rush to canonize your

memory. There is no need to do so. You stand tall enough as a human being of unique

qualities not to need to be seen as a saint.” This statement has several implications. It

at first refuses to make Diana into a saint, but then indicates that Diana was something

greater than a saint. This statement is followed in the eulogy by a description of some

of Diana’s attributes – “your wonderfully mischievous sense of humor with a laugh

that bent you double, your joy for life transmitted wherever you took your smile, and

the sparkle in those unforgettable eyes, your boundless energy which you could barely

contain.” These lines portray to the listener an image of a nice, smiling person, a

person that is always there for you. This line in fact portrays an almost saintly image,

contrary to the first line, which denies the need to view Diana as saintly. In addition,

though Spencer does mention Diana’s faults, he does not elaborate, and in fact turn

the faults into something positive as seen in the lines “The world sensed this part of

her character and cherished her for her vulnerability, whilst admiring her for her

honesty.” Thus while Diana’s positive attributes are expounded upon, her negative

attributes are mentioned in passing, and turned into something positive by Spencer.

Thus, in the mind of the listener, Diana is portrayed more as some greater being and

less like a normal person.

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 Aman Sethi
A.P. English
Mr. Powles
27th September, 2009

Spencer’s eulogy for Diana, while portraying Diana as a perfect being,

something greater than human, also portrays Diana as a normal human, with faults,

hopes and dreams. In the listeners mind, however, the image of the perfect being is

more strongly imprinted than the image of the vulnerable human. Though Spencer

displays Diana as a normal individual, describing her vulnerabilities and insecurities,

he does not do so in great detail. In addition, the faults that Spencer does describe,

through his use of language, become something positive and are portrayed as part of

Diana’s strengths. While describing Diana’s strengths however, Spencer embellishes

on his description of these attributes and uses refined language to emphasize these

attributes. Through this, Spencer causes the Diana’s faults to be pulled into the

background, and it helps in some ways to be a backdrop to Diana’s strengths, causing

the strengths to appear brighter in the face of adversary. Thus, the impression that

remains in the listeners mind is that of a saintly figure, and the human qualities and

Diana’s faults are lost in the crowd of strengths. Thus though Diana had her faults,

and strengths, Spencer in his eulogy portrays Diana as a person who suffered great

adversary and yet devoted herself to charitable and good causes, and in doing so

portrays Diana as a saint – like figure.

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 Aman Sethi
A.P. English
Mr. Powles
27th September, 2009

On my honour, I pledge that I have neither given nor received improper assistance in
completing this task.

___________________
Aman Sethi

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