ReutersThe Duke of Sussex has said he wants to repair his complicated relationships with his father and brother, in a magazine interview.
“Some people don’t want it to work out. I want it to work out. With everything else that’s going on in the world, the most important thing is to reconcile – that’s the key point,” Prince Harry told GQ in New York.
“Scars stick around forever. But what your perception is, and what your mindset is to those things that have happened, letting go of the past, that’s something that I would encourage everybody to do,” said Prince Harry.
Last week Prince Harry and Meghan carried out their first public engagement together since their return to the UK in the summer.
But a spokesman for the Sussexes said the interview was recorded in late September and it was the entirely the publishers’ decision when to run it – and that nothing should be read into the timing.
The spokesman also said that the reference to “some people don’t want it to work out” was not a swipe at his brother Prince William or any other member of his family.
Prince Harry and Meghan moved from the UK to the United States in 2020, stepping down as working royals in what was an acrimonious departure.
Harry’s memoir, Spare, showed the depth of the family fall out and the damaged relationship with his brother William.
Despite Prince Harry now being physically nearer to his family in the UK, there hasn’t seemed to be any more emotional closeness with his brother Prince William, and in this interview Harry seems to be open to reconciliation.
It was a message of wanting to build bridges that he had previously sent in a BBC interview in May 2025, when he had been living in the US.
Prince Harry recognised that this royal story of family disagreements fascinated the public, saying it was “massively relatable”.
“Sibling disagreements, broken relationships between kids and their parents, kids and one parent – that continues to come up with me the whole time with people that I speak to,” he said.
Asked by GQ about the reason for his move back to the UK, Prince Harry said: “Opportunities for the family. Being able to put the kids in a British school has meant a lot to me. I didn’t know how important it was to me.”
“They [Archie and Lilibet] are loving it, and it’s just giving them a whole different experience.”
He told the magazine: “To be back, closer to my family, and to be back on UK soil for longer than a few days or a week here or there”.
EPAPrince Harry also reflects on the King’s health, following his treatment for cancer, saying: “He’s getting better”.
There were also comments about growing up with a sense of loss after the death of his mother, Diana, Princess of Wales, in 1997.
“I love the fact that I’m able to now sort of carry the memory of my mother with me, with my work, rather than it hold me down, pull me back, or wallowing in that grief,” he said.
He rejected any sense of wanting public sympathy.
“I certainly don’t want any sympathy. That’s where we’re way past that. Why? Because I’m a prince. I’ve got a support network around me, I’ve done different forms of therapy, and I put in the work. I wonder where I would be if I didn’t – it could be a very different situation,” he said.
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