‘Prince Harry has just made a grave mistake, the Queen was right all along’ <\/a><\/p>\n\u201cIt is a profound honour to have been asked to write the official biography of Queen Elizabeth II,\u201d Dr Keay said of her appointment.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe was our longest-reigning monarch and an extraordinary woman, whose life spanned a century of great change.<\/p>\n
\u201cI am deeply grateful to His Majesty The King for entrusting me with this responsibility and for granting me access to her papers, and will do all I can to do justice to her life and work.\u201d<\/p>\n
It is customary for each monarch to appoint a biographer to write the official life of the previous monarch, with Queen Elizabeth commissioning one for her father, King George VI. John Wheeler-Bennett was tasked with the job.<\/p>\n
It will not be an easy undertaking for Dr Keay, best known for her work on British history, the monarchy and historic buildings, as she will have to cover a lengthy period, including several eyebrow-raising events that took place during the late Queen\u2019s reign.<\/p>\n
![\"The](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/edinburgh-scotland-prince-charles-prince-of-wales-known-as-the-duke-of-rothesay-when-in-6868820.jpg\" "\\"The")
<\/p>\n
King Charles has chosen Dr Keay to write the book (Image: Getty)<\/p>\n
From the breakdown of her son and heir\u2019s marriage to Diana, Princess of Wales, to the decision to block her sister from marrying divorced royal equerry Peter Townsend and the more recent scandals engulfing her son, Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, and the damage caused by the Duke and Duchess of Sussex\u2019s decision to quit the Firm.<\/p>\n
Dr Keay won\u2019t be able to simply skirt over such monumental events, but there will be an expectation that they be covered with sensitivity. It will be a work of huge historical importance and is expected to take years to come together.<\/p>\n
The historian, whose previous works include an award-winning account of Britain after the Civil War, a biography of James, Duke of Monmouth and The Official Illustrated History of the Crown Jewels, will join the King and Queen at a reception at the British Museum on Tuesday.<\/p>\n
At the event, the Queen Elizabeth Memorial Committee, of which she is a member, will present the recommended designs for the Queen Elizabeth Memorial in London.<\/p>\n
Dr Keay, read Modern History at Magdalen College, Oxford and has a PhD from Queen Mary, University of London. She was formerly a Curator of Historic Royal Palaces and the Curatorial Director of English Heritage and is currently a Trustee of the Royal Collection Trust and Director of the Landmark Trust.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Queen Elizabeth’s official biography has been selected (Image: Getty) British historian Dr Anna Keay has been given the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":202397,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[80194,80193,1428,5636,9,24,63,1312,80192,122,124,123,486],"class_list":{"0":"post-202396","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-queens","8":"tag-british-monarchy-history","9":"tag-dr-anna-keay","10":"tag-king-charles","11":"tag-king-charles-iii","12":"tag-new-york","13":"tag-new-york-city","14":"tag-nyc","15":"tag-queen-elizabeth-ii","16":"tag-queen-elizabeth-ii-biography","17":"tag-queens","18":"tag-queens-headlines","19":"tag-queens-news","20":"tag-royal-family"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/202396","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=202396"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/202396\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/202397"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=202396"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=202396"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=202396"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"President](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/windsor-england-queen-elizabeth-ii-attends-an-audience-with-the-president-of-switzerland-6868780.jpg\" "\\"President")
<\/p>\n