Kate Middleton only one who had 'anything close to a normal romance' compared to Meghan, Diana and Camilla, says royal author
The Prince and Princess of Wales met at university and were friends whilst other royal wives were 'fast-tracked into the Royal Family'
The Prince and Princess of Wales's marriage has often been compared to those of other royals but the way their relationship began sets them apart. In his book, The Four Wives of Windsor, royal correspondent Simon Vigar focuses on Queen Camilla, Princess Diana, Kate and Meghan and, according to him, the only one who "had anything close to a normal romance" was the future Queen.
"As undergraduates at St Andrews University, the friendship between Catherine and William was able to develop slowly and naturally - or at least as normally as possible given the fact that Scotland Yard's elite Royalty Protection Department were ever-present," he explains.
In contrast, he claims that both Princess Diana and Meghan "with varying degrees of failure" were "fast-tracked into the Royal Family". Prince William and Kate were friends for years before they got together and weren't rushed by speculation over when he was going to pop the question.
The future King admitted in their engagement interview in 2010 that one of the reasons he waited to propose was to give Kate time to "back out".
"Her and her family, I really want to make sure that they have the best, sort of, guidance and chance to see what life has been like - or what life is like - in the family," he said. "That's kind of almost why I've been waiting this long is that I wanted to give her a chance to see and to back out if she needed to before it all got too much."
The Princess of Wales did no such thing and earlier this year the couple marked their 15th wedding anniversary. Her brother-in-law Prince Harry and Meghan's journey from meeting to marrying spanned two years and she was well-known for her work on hit drama Suits, so their romance attracted plenty of attention from the start.
The Duchess herself has said that she "didn't fully understand what the job was" when she started dating Harry. In some ways, perhaps Princess Diana didn't either, as she was just 19 when she accepted King Charles's proposal and they married months later.
Vigar notes that Queen Camilla's journey was "slower" and went from "initially being The Other Woman" to "facing an interval of more than thirty years between first fling and engagement". Once again, all of this played out in the public eye and it was once unthinkable that she would ever become Queen because of backlash.
The reactions to each of these romances was very different, but William and Kate's relationship evolved more slowly and privately than the others. They have adapted to royal life and forged their own paths, with Kate knowing exactly what she was in for.
In this way, it could indeed be considered more "normal" and they've strived to raise their kids with a sense of normality too. The couple do school pick-ups and drop-offs themselves and William explained on The Reluctant Traveler how he wants to take elements of his childhood and make it even better for them.
"I think it's really important that that atmosphere is created at home, you have to have that feeling of warmth, security, love that all has to be there. And that was certainly part of my childhood. My parents got divorced at 8, so that lasted a short period of time but you take that and you learn from it," he declared.
