The queen, as imagined — from punk rock to mystery novels

In the spring of 2012, portrait artist Ralph Heimans stood on the Cosmati pavement of Westminster Abbey and awaited the subject of his latest commission, Queen Elizabeth II. “She’s got to be a rock for everyone, and has been trained not to.” The queen herself didn’t comment on works about her or always seem aware of cultural trends: Greeting Led Zeppelin guitarist Jimmy Page at a 2005 palace reception, she seemed unsure of who he was and what instrument he played. Bennett worked from the premise “What if the queen solved crimes?” in writing the mystery novels “The Windsor Knot” and “A Three Dog Problem.” “She had such a unique perspective on the world. The Smiths’ “The Queen Is Dead” mocks the royal family and the succession to power: “I say, Charles, don’t you ever crave/To appear on the front of the Daily Mail/Dressed in your Mother’s bridal veil?” The Sex Pistols helped define the punk movement in 1976 with ”God Save the Queen,” in which Johnny Rotten declares “No future” as he snarls out some of the most scathing, nihilistic lyrics ever to top the British charts: God save the queen The fascist regime They made you a moron A potential H bomb God save the queen She’s not a human being. In the late 1960s, Paul McCartney dashed off the acoustic, 23-second “Her Majesty,” with its cheeky refrain, “Her Majesty’s a pretty nice girl/But she doesn’t have a lot to say,” and the Beatles tacked it onto the end of “Abbey Road.” As he explained in “Paul McCartney: The Lyrics,” published in 2021, he wrote the song in part because the queen really didn’t offer many public statements, beyond her annual Christmas address and the opening of Parliament.