Saint Isobel: David Hare's The Secret Rapture as Christian Allegory

Saint Isobel: David Hare's The Secret Rapture as Christian Allegory LIORAH ANNE GOLOMB If ye were of the world, the world would love his own: but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you. (John 15:19) In his latest play, The Secret Rapture, David Hare has given us a central character, Isobel, who is distinctly not of the world. Even her name, a variant ofElizabeth, has as one of its meanings "consecrated to God. ,,' Dramatically, Hare took a great risk in centering his play on [sobel. She is weak, pliable and abused (a stark contrast to Hare's usual headstrong women such as Susan in Plenty or Peggy in A Map of the World), yet in order for the climax to have any impact, we must feel that something has been accomplished by her destruction, not that she has been one oflife's doormats who deserves what she gets. [f Isobel were merely a good woman who could not exist in a corrupt world the necessary sense of loss at her death might not be evoked, but Hare has raised her to the level of saint and martyr. Her death has a purging effect on the other characters, so that while there is loss there is also hope. Hare begins to establish Isobel's spirituality in the first moments of the play. Isobel, sitting with the body of her recently deceased father, tells her sister Marion: There's actually a moment when you see the spirit depart from the body. I've always been told about it. And it's true. (She is very quiet and still.) Like a bird,2 While Hare develops Isobel's spiritual nature, he places in contrast to her several varieties of rather earth-bound sinners, each traveling down a different path in search of salvation. Marion, the elder sister, is a Tory junior minister LIORAH ANNE GOLOMB entirely caught up in materialism and the exhilaration of power. It is by way of this character that Hare most directly voices his familiar political dissent. Marion is so extreme in her right-wing views that she needs no opposition to make her look the fool; she is quite capable of doing it herself, as when she proudly relates her retort to members of the Green Party who opposed her standpoint on nuclear energy: ,.,Come back and see me when you're glowing in the dark' " (p. 35). As we meet Marion she is trying to recover a ring which she had given to her father. In justifying her actions to Isabel (who, significantly, in no way indicates that she requires justification), she explains: For God's sake, I mean, the ring is actually valuable. Actually no, that sounds horrid. I apologize. I'll tell you the truth. I thought when I bought it - I just walked into this very expensive shop and I thought, this is one of the few really decent things I've done in my life. And it's true. I spent, as it happens. a great deal of money, rather more ... rather more than I had at the time. I went too far. I wanted something to express my love for my father. Something adequate . (p. 3) Marion cannot express her feelings emotionally; instead, she equates love with a valuable object. The speech also puts Isabel in the role of confessor. Marion is driven to confess by her own guilt - guilt which she experiences because she is in the presence of such goodness. Isabel never criticizes Marion, and even agrees that she should have the ring, yet later in the scene we find that Marion is still tormented by guilt: MARION I'm not going to forgive you. ISaBEL What? :MARION You've tried to humiliate me. ISaBEL Marion ... MARION You've made me feel awful. It's not my fault about the ring. Or the way I feel about Katherine. You make me feel as if I'm always in the wr~ng. ISaBEL Not at all. MARION Oh, yes. Well, we can't all be perfect. We do try. The rest of us are trying...