ARE you sitting comfortably? Then I’ll begin. Once upon a time, a young girl took a long journey over the sea to the big city where the Queen lived. When she arrived, she went to see the Queen’s palace. And as she stood, wondering at the splendours it contained, she dreamed – who wouldn’t? – about what it must be like to live in that palace, or in one a bit like it (this queen had several such items, you see, scattered around her kingdom and reachable by a special royal train). And as one dream begat another, the girl actually saw herself in the palace. Standing beside her was a prince who had fallen in love with her and made her his princess. But then she snapped back to reality. She thought: “Don’t be silly, girl. Nothing like that will ever happen to someone like you.” And then she thought another thought: “But never say never, right?”

Did you like the story? Sure it contains a little artistic licence – it is a fairy tale after all – but it also contains two incontrovertible facts. First, Meghan Markle did travel to London aged 15 and she did visit Buckingham Palace. We know because she posed for a photograph on the railings outside with a friend, demure and pretty in a black dress and a pair of the Converse pool sliders which were all the rage among well-heeled LA teenagers in 1996.

Two, she has bagged a Prince – Henry Charles Albert David Windsor (his birth name), aka Prince Henry of Wales (his posh name) aka Lieutenant Wales (his army name) aka Harry (his tabloid name, because you only need a mononym when you’re as famous as he is). The engagement was announced last week. Never say never, right?

So now there’s a wedding to look forward to – or dread, depending on where you sit on the republican/royalist spectrum – and, though tradition is fairly inflexible where royal nuptials are concerned, this one could end up being a little less by-the-numbers than previous ceremonies, due in part to the personalities of those involved, but also to the larger societal and political backdrop. The world, and the UK in particular, look very different today than they did when Prince Harry’s father married his mother, Diana Spencer, in 1981. And let’s not forget that for the future Princess of Wales, that fairy tale turned out to have a dark heart and a far from happy ending.

With all that in mind, here’s the Sunday Herald’s anatomy of a royal wedding in the age of Trump and Brexit.

The announcement

Blessedly it didn’t come in the form of a tweet or a leak or even a simple status change on Facebook. Instead, the gentlemen and ladies of the press were issued with a statement from the Prince of Wales dated Monday, November 27, announcing the engagement of his son, Prince Harry, to Ms Meghan Markle. It added that the Queen had been informed and the blessing of Ms Markle’s parents “sought and received”, and stated that the couple would live at the two-bedroom Nottingham Cottage in the grounds of Kensington Palace (or Nott Cott, as it’s known). Though it’s pleasing to imagine the Prince of Wales bashing out the announcement on a misfiring Olivetti typewriter, it actually came printed on Clarence House headed notepaper. So far, so traditional.

The bride

Three years older than her fiancé, 36-year-old Meghan Markle was born in Los Angeles on August 4, 1981 to a black mother (psychotherapist Dora Ragland) and a white father (Thomas Markle, an Emmy Award-winning lighting director working in TV). Through the Markle side of the family she is (supposedly) a descendent of King Edward III. Indeed US genealogists have claimed that she’s actually a 17th cousin of Prince Harry’s and a distant relative of several US presidents including the Bushes. On the Ragland side she’s descended from Georgia slaves.

Markle’s parents divorced when she was six. She grew up in Hollywood – you can do that: it’s an area as well as a shorthand term for hollow glamour – and was educated at the Immaculate Heart High School, a fee-paying, all-girl Catholic school whose alumni include model Tyra Banks, actress Ione Skye (daughter of Scottish 1960s folk star Donovan) and notorious Hollywood madam Heidi Fleiss. In 1993, aged 11, Markle wrote to then-First Lady Hillary Clinton to complain about a sexist TV ad for washing powder and was then interviewed about it on children’s channel Nickelodeon. You can still see the footage online. It was her first TV appearance.

Markle began her acting career proper with bit parts in soaps and series such as CSI. She worked on game show Deal Or No Deal, where she was one of the so-called “suitcase girls” who flash the prize money. And then she hit the big time in 2011 with a part in US TV series Suits. She plays ballsy paralegal Rachel Zane, one of the lead characters. Months after she landed the role, Markle married her partner of six years, film producer Trevor Engelson, though the marriage ended in divorce in 2013.

Away from acting she ran a “lifestyle brand” called The Tig (now in abeyance), and has worked in various ambassadorial roles for a number of humanitarian concerns including World Vision Canada, the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women, and the Young One World organisation.

She also writes. Earlier this year she contributed to Time magazine’s Ideas edition with an essay about the importance of de-stigmatising menstruation, not least because of the barriers to education it presents for young girls in places like India, Iran and sub-Saharan Africa. In 2015, meanwhile, she penned a biographical article for Elle magazine in which she addressed the problem of growing up mixed race, or bi-racial. She wrote about hearing the toxic N-word being shouted at her mother, about the difficulties she faced securing acting roles in a “label-driven” industry, and about the online abuse she received when the makers of Suits cast a black actor as her on-screen father. “When your ethnicity is black and white, the dichotomy is not that clear,” she wrote. “In fact, it creates a grey area. Being biracial paints a blurred line that is equal parts staggering and illuminating.”

The reaction

Shock? Not really. The pair have been dating for over a year, though that didn’t necessarily mean a marriage was on the cards. Just ask Chelsea Davy, who had a seven-year on-off relationship with Harry without ever hearing the Big Question popped. Or Cressida Bonas, who dated the Prince between 2012 and 2014 and remained similarly unencumbered by offers of marriage.

With them in mind, perhaps, right-wing magazine The Spectator took a typically contrarian view of the engagement. Chief attack dog was columnist Melanie McDonagh, who wrote that “70 years ago, Meghan Markle would have been the kind of woman the Prince would have had for a mistress, not a wife”.

McDonagh also attacked Markle’s stated liberal positions and opined that Prince Harry shouldn’t be marrying a divorced woman. “How has Melanie McDonagh managed to publish this article on the internet while she’s living in the 1950s?” tweeted one outraged social media user. 

But news of the engagement certainly didn’t come as much of a surprise to the makers of Suits. Interviewed on the Today programme on Tuesday, creator Aaron Korsh revealed that after seven series, the scriptwriters wrote Markle out of the show a year ago, having decided to “take a gamble that these two people were in love and it was going to work out”.

Predictably most British political leaders piled in with their congratulations, though none as ineptly as Democratic Unionist Party leader Arlene Foster. Her tweet congratulating the couple managed to name the wrong prince and spell Markle’s Christian name incorrectly. She later blamed the epic fail on a typo by whichever DUP functionary has jurisdiction over her smartphone and Twitter account while she’s doing more important things.

Looking for something a little more vinegary than most papers were offering, though not wanting to stoop to Spectator levels of spitefulness, one red-top turned to Mumsnet and cooked up a story based on a post which (though it’s a little hard to follow the argument) said the timing of the wedding was unfair to Prince William’s pregnant wife Kate Middleton. Why? Because she’s due to give birth in April so may have to breastfeed at the wedding. And also because William won’t be able to get drunk at the reception. Or something.

Princess Diana’s former butler Paul Burrell was another whose tuppence-worth was sought. He hit the daytime TV sofas and, asked when he thought the wedding would be, opted for April or May – but not June “because that’s when granny goes to Ascot”. He was right: a subsequent announcement gave the wedding month as May. The actual date is so far unconfirmed but the smart money is on Saturday, May 26, the spring bank holiday weekend (yes, even in Scotland).

Talking of Scotland, how do we view the engagement? With a massive yawn, if pollsters YouGov are to be believed. They found that 62 per cent of Scots are indifferent to the upcoming royal wedding, the highest percentage among any group polled. The other groups showing the least interest are those in the 18-24 age bracket, men, and Labour supporters. The survey doesn’t tell us what SNP voters think, though it’s safe to assume that few are jumping with excitement. On the other hand, if you’re a female Tory voter living in the north of England and aged 65 or over, the chances are you’re delighted by the news.

What doesn’t seem to concern anyone is the fact that Markle is divorced and of mixed race: 78 per cent of respondents were unfazed by the first fact, 69 per cent by the second. And, intriguingly, if you strip out the Don’t Knows, the percentage of people who think it acceptable for a member of the royal family to marry a member of the same sex is higher than those who don’t. Though that probably doesn’t hold in the offices of The Spectator.

The hen do …

All bets are off. But it’s not likely to be a drunken weekend racing plastic wind-up willies across tables in an Amsterdam pot shop with Markle in a ride-on unicorn costume and L plates, and everyone else dressed as Wonder Woman. Or to resemble the plot of Bridesmaids in any way at all except for the presence in the party of a load of Hollywood A-listers.

… And the stag do

Given Harry’s previous track record, this is bound to be a classy, quiet, low-key affair. Which is probably why one wag on Twitter wondered if Channel 5 had secured the TV rights and another has set up a Facebook event page, Prince Harry’s Stag Do. At the time of writing, 37,000 people said they were going and another 103,000 said they were interested. It should be quite a party.

The venue

The wedding will take place at St George’s Chapel, in the grounds of Windsor Castle. It’s where Harry’s uncle, Edward, married in 1999 and where his father’s union with Camilla Parker Bowles was blessed in 2005. Notionally it seats 800, though that would be a tight squeeze according to those who have been inside it. Presumably the event will be televised but presumably not on Channel 5: as everyone knows, for a fairytale wedding you need Huw Edwards and/or Fiona Bruce from the BBC.

According to an impeccable royal source – The Daily Telegraph – Harry will be created Duke of Sussex after the wedding, and his wife will be (drum roll) Her Royal Highness the Duchess of Sussex.

The guests

So who’ll get an invitation? On the list will be royals (both major and minor), plus politicians (including First Minister Nicola Sturgeon), diplomats and relatives of the bride.

Among the female celebrities who may soon be making an appointment with a hat-maker are Serena Williams (a friend of Markle’s and, in her words, “a down to earth chick”), model and activist Cara Delevingne, Indian actress Priyanka Chopra and even pop star Rihanna. Other potential invitees include David and Victoria Beckham, Markle’s Suits co-star Patrick J Adams and (though he’d probably be going anyway) Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who Markle became friendly with during a Young One World event.

At the time of writing, Donald Trump had yet to congratulate Markle on the engagement. That might have something to do with her having said she might leave the US if he became president. Or the fact that she referred to him in an interview as “misogynistic”. In fact the only Trumpian social media traffic which was in any way UK-related last week came when the US president re-tweeted three posts made by the far-right Britain First organisation and, as a result, became embroiled in a spat with Prime Minister Theresa May. Cue more calls for the offer of a state visit to be rescinded. “The President of the United States is promoting a fascist, racist, extremist hate group,” wrote Labour MP David Lammy, echoing the thoughts of many. “He is no ally or friend of ours … you are not welcome in my country and my city”. All that makes inviting Trump to the wedding a politically sensitive subject, especially as Barack and Michelle Obama may be going.

Notably, however, Obama didn’t attend Prince William’s wedding, reportedly because of the security costs, which gives Trump an out. Ironically, however, Obama was offered a state visit instead. Still, the chances are Trump won’t attend, even if he is invited, which will be a relief to everyone: we don’t want the smell of tear gas and the sound of rioting drifting into the chapel during the ceremony do we? Or do we?

And finally, the souvenir mug ...

Well, you know there’s going to have to be one – though hopefully the manufacturers won’t make the Arlene Foster-esque mistake of putting the wrong prince on the mugs, as one Chinese manufacturer did ahead of the last royal wedding.