The Unofficial British Royal Family Pages

Monday 6 September 2004

The Duke of Windsor - Byron's Romantic Hero

Part 2 of 2 - click here for part 1

When it comes to history, we often tend to simplify events and people to make them easier to digest and/or understand. Royalty is probably one of the easiest classes of historical figures to fall prey to this trap – i.e. Good Queen Bess, Bloody Mary, the Merry Monarch and Edward the Caresser, just to name a few. We know deep down, however, that no one – royal or not – is that easy to categorize. Certainly, in the case of the Duke of Windsor, he is neither exactly the wonderful romantic prince who chose love over power and privilege, nor is he the saboteur king who abandoned his throne for a wicked woman. The real Duke of Windsor was an incredibly complex individual coping with a great many inner conflicts – very much like the Romanticist ideal of the Byronic Hero. 

Last week, in Part 1, we explored the first four characteristics of the Byronic Hero – possesses great talent; is rebellious; lacks respect for rank and privilege; dislikes society and social institutions – to begin to see how the Duke of Windsor measures up to the literary ideal. This week, we evaluate him against the remaining characteristics of the Byronic Hero – is hiding something from the past; is highly passionate; is an exile – and consider how his correlation to all of the characteristics may have contributed to his ultimate self-destruction. 

Hides something from his past 

Conveniently for the supposedly darker side of the Duke of Windsor’s life, the secret the Byronic Hero hides from his past is often something of a sexual nature – and the Duke of Windsor has been accused of just about everything in this regard… from bisexuality/homosexuality to masochism to impotency. Many of the “theories” are a bit outlandish to say the least and, with little to go on other than a few dubious accounts by the various jilted lovers and enemies of both the Duke and Duchess of Windsor, I tend to disregard the more extreme claims. 

That said, I do concede that there may also be some truth in a few of the rumors and, if so, even a bit of early experimenting by the Duke during his youth and early manhood would certainly be something he would want to hide. After all, what we do know for certain about the sexual morals of the Duke of Windsor during his early life is that, while marriage was not for him, married women certainly were – although this he did little to hide. 

Is very passionate 

There’s little doubt that the Duke was passionate, both for what he believed in and for what he disliked. Nothing better symbolizes that passion than his abdication – the moment where both his distaste for the constraints of the monarchy and his desire for Wallis Simpson were at their most intense. Clearly, his passion drove him into taking action, whether positive or negative. But both before and after the drama of the abdication, the Duke’s deep-seated passion for his own beliefs, combined with an inability to keep his opinions to himself, no doubt contributed to many long-held criticisms of his actions and behavior. 

This is especially evident in his early sympathy for the Germans and what, I believe, is the foundation of the perception of him as a Nazi sympathizer. For the Duke, like many others in Britain who served in World War I, the prospect of another war was so horrible that almost any sacrifice was justified to avoid it – including cutting Britain off from Continental Europe. As King, the Duke also shared the commonly held belief that the Treaty of Versailles had been terribly unfair to Germany and, therefore, the aggressive movements of that country were justified. In his mind, the communists were “a greater threat to the west than fascism” and should thus be the focus of international control. Further, as a man with a deep sympathy for the unemployed workers of Britain, the Duke admired the fact that Hitler’s rearmament policy had brought full employment to Germany. 

Is an exile 

It seems easiest in this instance to cite the Duke of Windsor’s lifelong – though frequently interrupted – physical exile from Britain after his abdication in 1936; but the exile associated with a Byronic Hero does not always have to be so literal. Rather, exile can be interpreted as isolation from society or “normal” life. In the case of the Duke of Windsor, this type of exile is most certainly true both before and after his abdication.  

As we discovered last week in Part I, the Duke spent most of his life before the abdication distancing himself as much as possible from society and the social institutions that he abhorred. For their part, the court and polite society were offended not by his private conduct as Prince of Wales and King – after all, polite society could overlook a great many discreet digressions – but by the “vulgar display” and lack of discretion exhibited by him and his set. But, as long as he was either the heir to the throne or the king, he had to be tolerated. After he abdicated and married Wallis Simpson, however, he no longer had to try to distance himself, as most of polite society wanted little or nothing to do with him and no longer had any real obligation to do so. 

Ironically, and perhaps against the pattern of his own outward behavior, the Duke seemed to think at the time of his abdication (and probably before), that he could return to Britain at some point with Wallis and lead a life in British society similar to the King’s “younger brother.” For most of the rest of his life, he lived not only in the pursuit of this dream, but also for a place for himself and Wallis in the monarchical and societal systems he had previously shunned. 

It is at this point where, in my opinion, the Duke of Windsor truly becomes the ideal of the Byronic Hero – the real-life version of the idealized literary protagonist whose most human characteristics set him on a path to self-destruction. Despite, or perhaps because of, his talent and passion, his rebellious nature and perhaps questionable past drives him away from the rank and privilege he was born to and isolates him from the social institutions he’s bound to, ultimately disconnecting him from the only life that he really knows. As a result, he spends the rest of his life trying desperately to hold on to Wallis, his foremost object of desire, while at the same time seeking to recover everything he gave up for her. In the end, his objective saps him not only of his strength and health, but also of any real direction and purpose in life.  

Just before his death in 1972, the combination of his fragile and benign appearance and his reverence and respect of the monarchy make it a bit easier to see the Duke of Windsor as a romantic hero. Knowing more about his past helps reinforce the idea of him as a Byronic Hero. Most important of all, however, is remembering that the Duke of Windsor was, above all else, a human being who must be defined not by extreme interpretations of his actions, but by careful consideration of both his strengths and weaknesses and their effect on his life.

Until next week, 

- Tori Van Orden Mart�nez