Prince Charles Can't "Deal" with Prince Harry's Criticisms, a Royal Expert Says

• The feuding going on in the royal family is intense, but at least one expert says there are commonalities between the current royal drama and Princess Diana's experience speaking out in the 1990s.
• Stewart Pearce, author of Diana, The Voice of Change (opens in new tab), says Prince Harry's claims that his father has cut off communication amid their issues is similar to the way Prince Charles reacted to conflict with Diana. 
• "That’s what Charles does.…He can’t deal with it because of his sensitivity, so he hides," Pearce said.

Prince Charles (opens in new tab) just can't handle criticism from his son, Prince Harry (opens in new tab), apparently.

In an interview with Us Weekly (opens in new tab), royal author (and personal friend/voice coach of Princess Diana (opens in new tab)) Stewart Pearce (opens in new tab) offered commentary that he described to the out as "just simply categoric observations about how perhaps [some royals’] behavior [were] not always as emotionally intelligent as it could be."

One of those observations was about Diana's ex, Prince Charles, who has recently been clashing with the couple's youngest son, Harry.

"For example, Prince Charles is a very, very shy man, a very sensitive and delicate man, but we see his public personality, but in private, he’s immensely sensitive," Pearce said.

The Diana, The Voice of Change (opens in new tab) author went on to describe the way Charles reacted to Diana's public allegations of infidelity—which he says could offer some insight into how Charles is handling his current situation with Harry (opens in new tab). Specifically, Pearce sees echoes of Diana's experience in conflict with Charles in comments harry has made about not having much communication with his father lately.

"What he did was to shrink back and as a result of that became an aloof. Well, that doesn’t heal the challenge that’s taking place," Pearce said of Charles' response to Diana going public with information about his affair. "That’s what Charles does.…He can’t deal with it because of his sensitivity, so he hides. And what Harry’s trying to do is to heal that. Not out of umbrage, not out of anger or revenge or criticism or accusation.…I felt that he was just somebody saying, ‘This is the way that it is, and this is why we want to make change.'"

This is clearly a sensitive situation all around, and we can only hope that everyone involved is able to heal and reconnect when the time is right.