Prince Charles at 70: What is the point of the longest-serving heir to the throne?

The Prince of Wales has always been the odd royal out. He spent his youth surfing on the margins of society, before floundering on the seas of a troubled marriage. Since then, he has taken up the only sensible function now left open to him – to offer opinions on everything under the sun. By Andy Martin

The prince’s purpose flows from his inability to quite fit into time and space (Rex)

It wasn’t quite a royal wave. More like a royal glance. To be honest, I might have waved, or possibly saluted, or at least stood to attention. Not long ago, the Queen drove right past me in her Regal Roller on Lisson Grove. Lots of police outriders and suchlike. A chauffeur of course. But I saw her and she saw me. Then she took a right on Rossmore Road and she was gone. But she had bestowed upon me the royal gaze for a fleeting instant. So I know she’s real and, more importantly, so am I. There was a mutual confirmation of existence. Which was strangely reassuring.

Because otherwise you could be forgiven for assuming that the Great British royal family is a figment of the imagination of George RR Martin – the mind behind Game of Thrones – or possibly a series on Netflix. Like Coronation Street and EastEnders, royalty is a shared soap opera that glues the nation if not exactly together then at least to the screens or headlines about the latest birth, marriage, death, or better still, juicy scandal.

But where does Prince Charles fit into this great unreality show? The answer is that he doesn’t. Not really. He is, and always will be, the odd man out. And that may well be his saving grace. It is a little-known fact that the young Prince of Wales was once a surfer and a windsurfer. A fugitive from landlocked society. But even right out on the margins he was always marginal. More of a wannabe.