With the Royal wedding been and gone, many of us may have thought that we had seen the last of Kate, Will and the Middleton clan. But no, Middleton mania is fast becoming an epidemic.
Even before the big day, we were supplied with helpful reminders of the up-and-coming nuptials. With television shows, tea sets, biscuit tins, tea towels, dolls of the happy couple and even memorabilia making its way into the bedroom; in order to guarantee that even in our most intimate moments the royal wedding would not be far from our thoughts.
I am the first to admit that the buzz of the royal wedding was highly contagious, as I found myself, like millions of viewers around the world, swept up in the royal wedding excitement and tuning in on Friday April 29 to witness this momentous occasion.
Was it being patriotic, a royalist or just a fan of weddings? I’m still not sure. Regardless I found myself sitting for hours postponing revision to make sure I didn’t miss a moment of it. The allure was there and once I had tuned in to watch the guests arrive I was hooked for the whole ceremony. To save face I resorted to saying that this would be something to tell the grandchildren about but in reality I was engrossed.
After watching the wedding and beginning to get on with day-to-day life, I was blissfully unaware that outbreaks of Middleton Mania were only just starting.
Since the royal wedding I have read headlines such as, “Pippa Middleton’s bottom early favourite for rear of the year award” and “Kate Middleton’s royal wedding perfume has waiting list”. It appears that overnight Kate and the Middleton Family have become celebrities, in this classic rags-to-riches storybook ending. The once commoners who we may have bumped into in our local Spar, are now adorning our kitchens and bathrooms, with soaps, chocolates and tea sets.
So is this a bad thing? We hear about celebrity culture and are immediately meant to conjure up in our minds images of vanity; size zero models and faddy diets transforming the youth of today into stick-insects. Indulgence is another image commonly associated with the privileged few; people on television who are too rich, too irresponsible etc.
Yet I would argue that although the country has become obsessed with the Middleton family, the excitement over Kate Middleton’s wedding dress and what colour the Queen’s wedding hat might be on the day (yellow- for anyone who did not tune in), made a nice change from the usual doom and gloom we are so accustomed to hearing about on the news.
So although I won’t be littering, or should that be, adorning my campus room with images of Kate and Will and going down the gym to work on perfecting the Pippa Middleton bottom, I will be comforted in the knowledge that the Middletons are turning the public’s mind off the credit crunch and that with only BBC iPlayer at my disposal, I can be part of this Middleton Mania if and when I choose.
