Questions

I’m not really sure what sort of commentary Margaret’s making with this arrangement:

I have a number of thoughts.

On the one hand, she could be postulating that Elizabeth’s summer progresses (symbolized by the stroller) were an attempt to control the forces of unrest within the kingdom (the wild thing) and to assert her relationship to her father, and thus the kingdom (the Henry VIII bear).

On the other, there could be some subtle commentary on Elizabeth’s need for a relationship with her father, who should have been cuddly and friendly in her youth, but was transformed into something frightening.

I have other theories, but they get a bit involved.

Some of you might be wondering why Margaret has a Queen Elizabeth doll and a Henry VIII teddy bear.  They are, in fact, mine, but they were both gifts, so I’m not taking the blame here.  And she likes them because they’re shiny.*

*Actually, there’s a reasonable amount of evidence that that is at least in part why their subjects liked the originals, so she’s in good company.  Or at least company.  I mean, part of the reason for Elizabeth’s summer progresses, besides giving people a chance to clean out the palaces, was so that people saw her being shiny and decided that she should be queen because of her shininess.