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Did a "toilet" come between them?
We will probably never know. But the reports last week that Prince William and his girlfriend, Kate Middleton, broke up in part because of her mother's so-called middle-class behavior, including using the word toilet for bathroom, are a vivid reminder that class issues still bubble vexingly beneath the surface of British life.
Mrs. Middleton's other missteps, apparently, included having once worked as a flight attendant, a fact that caused some of William's friends to cattily mutter "Doors to manual" whenever Kate came into the room.
But it doesn't really matter what she did or did not do. What is significant is that even in new, egalitarian Britain, everyone seemed so mesmerized by accounts of it, so ready to believe in the return of the class war that had supposedly ended in a truce years ago. Why Can't the English Just Give Up That Class Folderol? (Read on) by Sarah Lyall
Mark Alexander
