King Charles III is the king of Britain. He ascended the throne after the death of his mother, Queen Elizabeth II.
Charles has made eight pilgrimages to a monastery in Greece. In 1998, when heir to the throne, he privately lauded Orthodoxy's "timeless traditions" compared with the "loathsome political correctness" of other churches. As king and governor of the Church of England, however, he knows he must express orthodox views, not Orthodox ones.
An Economist analysis of all public speeches delivered by Charles over three decades, scored by OpenAI's large language model for how much each speech challenged mainstream opinion or royal convention, found that Charles has mellowed significantly. His average controversy score was 3.7 out of ten in the late 1990s, compared with 2.1 since he ascended the throne. By contrast, speeches by Queen Elizabeth II between 2000 and 2022 scored just 1.7. Asked seven years before his accession whether he would be an activist king, the then Prince Charles said: "I'm not that stupid."
Breaking ground on the construction of the new Whittle Laboratory in Cambridge—Britain's leading aerospace research lab—was his first official engagement after his coronation.
On September 17th 2025 he hosted a banquet at Windsor Castle for Donald Trump's state visit. He made a rare public overture, declaring Britain and America united in Ukraine's struggle. Trump was conveyed in a gilded carriage to inspect a parade of red-tunicked guardsmen.
King Charles visited America on April 27th-30th 2026, ostensibly to commemorate the 250th anniversary of American independence from Britain. The trip turned into a mission to help salvage the countries' "special relationship" amid the worst rift between the allies since the Suez crisis of 1956. The king faced fallout from the scandal around Jeffrey Epstein and the sex-trafficker's connections to the British elite, not least his brother Prince Andrew. The king wears old, patched suits and once called the prospect of kingship "ghastly".
In February 2026 the king was heckled twice in a single week over his brother Prince Andrew's links to Jeffrey Epstein. On February 9th a Buckingham Palace spokesman said the king stood "ready to support" a police investigation into Andrew. Charles had already stripped his brother of his royal status and home. In polls the king has barely been tarnished by Andrew's antics, but the fallout is widening: some of Andrew's aides were deeply implicated in facilitating meetings with Epstein.
Absence makes the heart forget.