I don’t believe in ghosts.  But once someone has died, I think they continue with us.  They continue in our memories and through their children (if lucky enough to have them): a tilt of the head or a look suddenly represents them to us.   We hear music, we visit a place, we hold an object dear to them and they are with us once again:  a vivid, piercing, disorientating flash of recollection.  For a moment they stand next to us, sharing our senses, placing their hands on ours.  We feel both joyful and bereft.

Their bittersweet lingering lasts, perhaps, only as long as there are people able to recognise them; conversely, perhaps someone is never completely dead until all remembrance is past.  This may be too fanciful, but I have just seen The Tempest, Shakespeare’s magical play of memories, enfolded time, loss and restoration, loved children and invisible spirits.  Fancy seems full of potency.  And Ariel, the airy spirit, invisible to all but Prospero, is a little like a benevolent ghost.  At least, sometimes we can feel like Prospero:  we discover an invisible presence at our shoulder, strange yet familiar.

My Ariel is, of course, my mother who, I begin to recognise, haunts this blog just as she haunts the rest of my life.  I have written before about going to Stratford with her, how a shared love of Shakespeare became a cornerstone in our relationship and how Simon Russell Beale was one of her favourite actors.  Although, obtusely, I had not anticipated it, she was – of course – inevitably – vividly at my shoulder yesterday, transforming the day into something ‘rich and strange’.  I watched the performance through two sets of eyes.

The play was more resonant and profound than I had understood before.  I saw parallels between The Tempest and Hamlet:  like Hamlet’s Father, Prospero has been usurped by his brother and is driven to seek revenge.  But on this magical isle (in these magical late plays) Shakespeare takes our darkest and most destructive emotions, takes his own tragedies, and conjures a place where we can be liberated from them.  Time plays its part, wise counsel another.  It’s impossible to do this alone – we have to accept help from beyond ourselves.  Prospero’s help comes from Ariel, who not only does Prospero’s bidding to control the events of the play but also, crucially, says ‘If you now beheld them, your affections Would become tender.’ 

Prospero : Dost thou think so, spirit?
Ariel: Mine would, sir, were I human.
Prospero:  And mine shall.

The non-human spirit prompts Prospero to become humane.  He can, he must now act according to his ‘nobler reason’.  Having brought the conspirators to penitence, he abjures vengeance:

Prospero: The sole drift of my purpose doth extend
Not a frown further

This maturity of thought feels particularly precious and restorative at the moment, when superficiality and bitterness are having their political day.  I do not know what The Tempest can offer to UK or US politics, but yesterday I was comforted to be reminded that the play continues to cast its own deep, gracious spell.   Listening to, and watching, such a beautiful, complex work of art was like taking a deep draught of clean, pure water.

This was my first visit to the Royal Shakespeare Theatre since mum’s death, so I wanted to find the seat my brother and I had dedicated to her memory.  It is at the back of the stalls, L8, since you ask.   Should anything of mum’s spirit linger outside our thoughts, separate from the genes which continue through into her grandchildren – should I be wrong, in other words, and ghosts exist –  then I think she would be very happy to haunt seat L8.  An appreciative, kindly presence, she would relish watching her beloved Shakespeare night after night, exploring all the richness of humanity.  If you are ever in the Royal Shakespeare Theatre – should you ever sit in seat L8 – listen:  amidst the applause, there may be a gentle echo, an extra, ghostly handclap.  That’ll be mum.