From the BBC:
“Princess
Leonor of Spain's royal profile rises as she comes of age”
(Princess Leonor of Spain delivers a speech during the 2023
Princess of Asturias Awards ceremony at Teatro Campoamor in Oviedo, northern
Spain, 20 October 2023.)
Spain's Princess Leonor is about to turn 18, thrusting her
into the spotlight as heir to the throne and raising questions about the role
she will play as an adult royal. Her birthday, on Tuesday, will be marked by a
formal ceremony in the Spanish Parliament, at which she will swear allegiance
to the Constitution before receiving the medals of Congress and the Senate. Anticipating
the event, the Spanish royal family has released a series of photos of the
princess, many of them previously unpublished.
(Her parents, the current King and Queen of Spain,
accompanied Leonor to her first day of school)
They include one of her on her first day of school, flanked
by her mother, Queen Letizia, and her father, King Felipe VI, who was then
still a prince himself. Another shows her in 2010, clutching the World Cup
trophy the Spanish men's football team had just won. Others show her alongside
her younger sister Sofía. Underlining the significance of her birthday, there
will also be a reception in the Royal Palace in Madrid, followed by a family
gathering in the El Pardo palace, just outside the capital.
The release of the photos and a series of recent appearances
by the princess leading up to her birthday confirm that, after years of having
her image carefully shielded, she is now becoming a very public figure. "Leonor
will need her own narrative," noted royal biographer Carmen Remírez de
Ganuza, adding that she "will have to connect with her own digital
generation". While the exact nature of that narrative is not yet clear,
the build-up to the princess's arrival as a senior royal has gone smoothly.
In May, she graduated from UWC Atlantic, a boarding school in
the Vale of Glamorgan, Wales, where she had been studying for the International
Baccalaureate. As she received her diploma, her fellow students whooped and
cheered and her tutor praised her "unwavering passion for learning, for
understanding people, and exploring diverse perspectives" as well as her
sense of humour.
(Leonor is attending military school in Spain)
The Spanish media then closely followed the conclusion of the
princess's basic training at an army academy in Zaragoza, where she has begun a
three-year officer's course. Leonor, like her classmates, was seen performing
drill dressed in beret and fatigues and receiving a ceremonial sword.
Her royal duties then came to the fore as she presided over
her own Princess of Asturias awards on 20 October. Decorating individuals from
a variety of fields, including Hollywood actress Meryl Streep and Japanese
novelist Haruki Murakami, Leonor assured those present that "I fully
understand and am conscious of my duties and what my responsibilities entail".
As she praised Streep, she spoke of how the actor was able to shed her own
persona in order to take on her roles "and do so throughout an impeccable
career, with freedom, courage and sensitivity to the challenges of our
time". The princess could have been outlining the role she sees for
herself as first in line to a throne which has faced some severe tests in
recent years.
In 2017, for example, King Felipe took the unusual step of
wading into the political sphere by speaking out against Catalan separatists
who were attempting to break away from Spain. In 2020, Leonor's grandfather
Juan Carlos, who had abdicated six years earlier and was mired in financial
scandals, left the country to live in Abu Dhabi. Although the scandals have
dropped away, he has lived there ever since. But beyond Leonor's institutional
position lies another, less solemn role as a figure orbiting Spain's celebrity
universe.
Already there is talk of "Leonormania" in light of
the interest in her rising profile. Earlier this year, there were rumours that
she was romantically linked to Barcelona and Spain football player Pablo Martín
Páez Gavira, known as Gavi. Those reports turned out to be false, but they
highlighted the appetite in some quarters for the princess to be a part of pop
culture. Paris Match ran a headline on the Bulgari earrings that Leonor had
worn for the Princess of Asturias awards ceremony. Journalist Jesús Reyes has
even written a book about Leonor through the lens of her taste in fashion,
which he claims she has inherited from her mother. "From her father, King
Felipe, she has inherited his commitment to the Crown, his extremely polite
manners [and] his constant smile and pleasantness," wrote Reyes. However,
after her 18th birthday, Princess Leonor is likely to find that she will be
much more than a purely institutional figure.
^ She is the Future Queen of Spain so hopefully she can both
Modernize it and keep it’s Traditions. ^
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