Sovereign for barely two years, Charles III celebrates his 76th birthday this Thursday, November 14. He is still being treated for cancer.
King Charles III, still being treated for cancer, celebrates his 76th birthday this Thursday, November 14, after a year which according to his son Prince William was “the hardest of (his) life”. A year that could be compared to what Queen Elizabeth had described as an annus horribilis, the year 1992, marked by several divorces within the royal family, and the fire of Windsor Castle.
To celebrate this anniversary, the official accounts of the royal family and that of the Prince and Princess of Wales both published a photo of the sovereign. The first very classic, with a blue suit and gilding, the second more unusual, of the sovereign with sunglasses and a flower necklace.
Still very active, the king resumed his commitments at the end of April, two and a half months after the announcement of his illness. “The problem is trying to stop it,” Queen Camilla confided several times.
The 77-year-old queen consort herself experienced health problems this week and had to cancel several engagements due to a lung infection.
She was also absent on Wednesday evening at the premiere of Gladiator IIwhere Charles met the film crew alone.
The “reinvigorated” king
In October, the couple resumed their overseas travels, with a trip to Australia and Samoa for the Commonwealth summit. The king came back “reinvigorated” according to his entourage, despite the numerous commitments of this 11-day marathon in the Antipodes.
He plans to resume a “normal rhythm” of trips abroad next year, according to a source at the palace.
Cancer did not affect his determination to “serve the time I have left to live”, as he declared when he became king upon the death of his mother, Queen Elizabeth II, on September 8, 2022, after having prepared for this role for over 70 years.
Return of Kate
On Sunday, Charles III presided, pensive in the cold London, over the ceremonies paying tribute to the dead of the wars since 1914, a highlight each year of the royal calendar. The day before, he had traveled with William and Princess Kate, who recently completed chemotherapy, to the Royal Albert Hall for a memorial concert. This was his first major royal engagement since the end of his treatment.
After receiving Bahrain's King Hamad bin Issa Al Khalifa on Tuesday, Charles III hosted a reception at Buckingham Palace on Wednesday in honor of the British film and television industry, before attending the evening before -world premiere of Gladiator II.
And no rest for his birthday, traditionally marked by salvos of cannon fire in the middle of the day. In the United Kingdom, the official birthday of the sovereign is celebrated in June, with a military parade called Trooping the color.
The king is due to inaugurate this Thursday in south London a center for the redistribution of surplus food, as part of a “Coronation food project” launched for his 75th birthday, where he will notably discover, according to the palace, a new freezer industrial.
Charles III back in business, eight months after announcing his cancer
The year has been difficult for the royal family in many ways: communication remains broken with Prince Harry and his wife Meghan, despite the deposed prince's pleas.
Furthermore, Charles and William's millions of income were recently the subject of an incriminating documentary, and the issue of reparations for slavery became more pressing at the Commonwealth summit.
In February, the palace announced the king's cancer a few weeks after prostate surgery, specifying that it was not prostate cancer.
“Proud of my father”
In March, two months after a serious abdominal operation, the Princess of Wales, the most popular member of the royal family, announced in turn that she was suffering from cancer, again without further details.
The 42-year-old princess delighted her many fans by announcing the end of her chemotherapy on September 9, in a video posted on social networks.
She has since resumed commitments little by little.
“Honestly, it’s been terrible. It’s probably the hardest year of my life,” Prince William, heir to the throne, said on November 7. “I'm so proud of my wife, I'm proud of my father, for handling the situation the way they did,” he said during a trip to South Africa.
“But from a family, personal point of view, it was very hard.”
Health remains a constant royal concern. A doctor accompanied the king on his trip to Australia and Samoa last month. On their return, the king and queen spent three days in a relaxation center in Bangalore, India, to “break up” their long journey.
The king, a long-time environmentalist, did not travel to Baku in Azerbaijan for COP29.
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