Queen Elizabeth made us feel less embarrassed about Britishness and empire
Without the Queen, we are scrambling to find a national identity we can be proud of.
ByQueen Elizabeth
Elizabeth II was Queen of the United Kingdom from 1952 through to her death in 2022, the longest-reigning monarch in British history. Find here all of the New Statesman’s latest content about Queen Elizabeth II, or visit our related section pages on the Royal Family and King Charles III.
“Elizabeth the Great”: MPs pay tribute to the Queen
Liz Truss, Keir Starmer, Boris Johnson and Theresa May led parliament in memorial.
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Andrew Marr: why I broke down when announcing the death of the Queen
Our political editor describes the moment he had to break the news live on air.
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The Queen made us a gentler and kinder country
Having a motherly figure as the representative of state power has been overwhelmingly positive.
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The Queen’s death leaves a nation unsure of its place in the world
This is the second act of a national realignment that began with the UK’s departure from the EU.
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The death of the Queen marks the final break with imperial Britain
Her reign was a link to a country still in the twilight of empire.
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The end of an era – and what will happen this week
As Keir Starmer has said, the Queen was “the still point of our turning world”.
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Andrew Marr: the Queen’s death will shake us all
Our political editor reflects on the Queen’s remarkable life and legacy.
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Why meeting the Queen was always so special for politicians
She was inscrutable about her own opinions; she just wanted the best for her country. It was so refreshing.
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Queen Elizabeth II has died
The longest-serving British monarch had reigned since 1952.
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Graham Brady’s Diary: What the press got wrong about the confidence vote, and my very odd kind of celebrity
Press reports on how close I was to hearing from the requisite 54 Conservative MPs were almost always wide of…
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The interventions of Prince Charles will end in calamity – for him and the monarchy
The Queen creates unity by managing to say everything and nothing. The heir to the throne does not have this…
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Horses, heather and hierarchy: Is the monarchy good for nature?
The condition of the Royal Estates also suggest there is much to modernise despite the monarchy’s legacy of hands-on conservation.
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Platinum Jubilee is the last hurrah for Britain’s easy relationship with its monarchy
Hanging over the festivities is the weirdly under-discussed fact that the next time this country celebrates its queen, she will…
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What’s the point of a poet laureate?
A Poet for Elizabeth on Radio 4 looks back at the seven poets who have taken the role during the…
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How Queen Elizabeth II’s sense of duty prevailed in an age of individualism
The monarch’s 70 years on the throne were defined by her conservatism. What happens when a new generation takes over?
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Wanted: A leader for Britain’s post-Jubilee republican movement
The public loves the Queen, but the fact is she is unlikely to celebrate any more Jubilees after this one.…
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Grayson’s Art Club Jubilee special: a terrifying extravaganza for the bunting obsessed
If television is, as I believe it to be, a barometer of national cultural health, this country is getting madder…
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This England: Losing Faith
This column – which, though named after a line in Shakespeare’s “Richard II”, refers to the whole of Britain –…
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The Jubilee Pudding celebrates a historic milestone with piles of jelly and lashings of cream
Our national identity now seems to be based entirely on flour, sugar, eggs and butter.
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