The Duchess of Cornwall has revealed that her five grandchildren enjoy nothing more than listening to Prince Charles read them Harry Potter stories at bedtime.
Prince Charles is excellent at Harry Potter voices, says Camilla. Picture by Stephen Lock / i-Images
Camilla said that her husband loves to spend time with her grandchildren who are aged between seven and nine, and that the heir to the throne doesn’t just read the Potter stories – he acts out all the roles!
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“Sometimes, when we are with my husband in Scotland, he reads them Harry Potter,” the Duchess said. She and The Prince of Wales spend most of the summer at Birkhall, The Queen Mother’s former residence.
“And he does all the voices, because he is a brilliant mimic. I’m not very good. I try to do the voices, but acting isn’t my forte. But he sits down and they all sit with him. I always think they are going to be wriggling around in the bed, but they sit spellbound.”
“It’s really sweet,” she said. “He’s extremely good with children. They love it.”
The Prince of Wales is no novice to reading children’s stories. In 1984 he appeared on the BBC’s classic children’s television programme, Jackanory to read his own book, “The Old Man of Lochnagar“. The Prince wrote the book in 1980 to raise money for the Prince’s Trust charity.
Speaking to the Daily Mail for an interview to mark her 70th birthday, Camilla added, “Children keep you young,”
“I have my grandchildren quite a lot. They are charging about all over the place. You can’t just sit down and say: ‘Sorry, I’m too old, I can’t play’.”
Known to her grandchildren as ‘Gaga’, the Duchess is passionate about literacy in children and is patron of several organisations including National Literacy Trust, Book Trust, First Story, the Wicked Young Writer Awards and Beanstalk.
The Duchess is a supporter of BBC Radio 2’s 500 Words creative writing competition. This year, the future Queen was an honorary judge again.
Meanwhile Stephen Fry who is a friend of Prince Charles and who voiced the Harry Potter audio books might think he has some royal competition!
