Principle of Interpreting (Interveiw transcript) For Semester Vl

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This is a transcript of the interview with the Princess of Wales provided by the BBC. Parts of it will air on ABC-TV on Friday, Nov. 24, 1995

QUESTION: Your Royal Highness, how prepared were you for the pressures that came with marrying into the Royal Family?

DIANA: At the age of 19, you always think you're prepared for everything, and you think you have the knowledge of what's coming ahead. But although I was daunted at the prospect at the time, I felt I had the support of my husband-to-be.

QUESTION: What were the expectations that you had for married life?

DIANA: I think like any marriage, especially when you've had divorced parents like myself, you'd want to try even harder to make it work and you don't want to fall back into a pattern that you've seen happen in your own family.
I desperately wanted it to work, I desperately loved my husband and I wanted to share everything together, and I thought that we were a very good team.

QUESTION: How aware were you of the significance of what had happened to you? After all, you'd become Princess of Wales, ultimately with a view to becoming Queen.

DIANA: I wasn't daunted, and am not daunted by the responsibilities that that role creates. It was a challenge, it is a challenge.
As for becoming Queen, it's, it was never at the forefront of my mind when I married my husband: it was a long way off that thought.
The most daunting aspect was the media attention, because my husband and I, we were told when we got engaged that the media would go quietly, and it didn't; and then when we were married they said it would go quietly and it didn't; and then it started to focus very much on me, and I seemed to be on the front of a newspaper every single day, which is an isolating experience, and the higher the media put you, place you, is the bigger the drop.
And I was very aware of that.

QUESTION: How did you handle the transition from being Lady Diana Spencer to the most photographed, the most talked-about, woman in the world?

DIANA: Well, it took a long time to understand why people were so interested in me, but I assumed it was because my husband had done a lot of wonderful work leading up to our marriage and our relationship.
But then I, during the years you see yourself as a good product that sits on a shelf and sells well, and people make a lot of money out of you.

QUESTION: It's been suggested in some newspapers that you were left largely to cope with your new status on your own. Do you feel that was your experience?
DIANA: Yes I do, on reflection. But then here was a situation which hadn't ever happened before in history, in the sense that the media were everywhere, and here was a fairy story that everybody wanted to work.
And so it was, it was isolating, but it was also a situation where you couldn't indulge in feeling sorry for yourself: you had to either sink or swim. And you had to learn that very fast.
QUESTION: And what did you do?

DIANA: I swam. We went to Alice Springs, to Australia, and we went and did a walkabout, and I said to my husband: `What do I do now?'
And he said, `Go over to the other side and speak to them.' I said, `I can't, I just can't.'
He said, `Well, you've got to do it.' And he went off and did his bit, and I went off and did my bit. It practically finished me off there and then, and I suddenly realised - I went back to our hotel room and realised the impact that, you know, I had to sort myself out.
We had a six-week tour - four weeks in Australia and two weeks in New Zealand - and by the end, when we flew back from New Zealand, I was a different person. I realised the sense of duty, the level of intensity of interest, and the demanding role I now found myself in.

QUESTION: Were you overwhelmed by the pressure from people initially?

DIANA: Yes, I was very daunted because as far as I was concerned I was a fat, chubby, 20-year-old, 21-year-old, and I couldn't understand the level of interest.

QUESTION: At this early stage, would you say that you were happily married?

DIANA: Very much so. But, the pressure on us both as a couple with the media was phenomenal, and misunderstood by a great many people.
We'd be going round Australia, for instance, and all you could hear was, oh, she's on the other side. Now, if you're a man, like my husband a proud man, you mind about that if you hear it every day for four weeks. And you feel low about it, instead of feeling happy and sharing it.

QUESTION: When you say `she's on the other side', what do you mean?

DIANA: Well, they weren't on the right side to wave at me or to touch me.

QUESTION: So they were expressing a preference even then for you rather than your husband?

DIANA: Yes - which I felt very uncomfortable with, and I felt it was unfair, because I wanted to share.

QUESTION: But were you flattered by the media attention particularly?

DIANA: No, not particularly, because with the media attention came a lot of jealousy, a great deal of complicated situations arose because of that.

QUESTION: At this early stage in your marriage, what role did you see for yourself as Princess of Wales? Did you have an idea of the role that you might like to fulfil?

DIANA: No, I was very confused by which area I should go into. Then I found myself being more and more involved with people who were rejected by society - with, I'd say, drug addicts, alcoholism, battered this, battered that - and I found an affinity there.
And I respected very much the honesty I found on that level with people I met, because in hospices, for instance, when people are dying they're much more open and more vulnerable, and much more real than other people. And I appreciated that.

QUESTION: Had the Palace given any thought to the role that you might have as Princess of Wales?

DIANA: No, no one sat me down with a piece of paper and said: `This is what is expected of you.' But there again, I'm lucky enough in the fact that I have found my role, and I'm very conscious of it, and I love being with people.

QUESTION: So you very much created the role that you would pursue for yourself really? That was what you did?

DIANA: I think so. I remember when I used to sit on hospital beds and hold people's hands, people used to be sort of shocked because they said they'd never seen this before, and to me it was quite a normal thing to do.
And when I saw the reassurance that an action like that gave, I did it everywhere, and will always do that.

QUESTION: It wasn't long after the wedding before you became pregnant. What was your reaction when you learnt that the child was a boy?

DIANA: Enormous relief. I felt the whole country was in labour with me. Enormous relief.