Isabella Hammad
Enter Ghost by Isabella Hammad unfolds in the first-person voice of Sonia Nasir, a thirty-eight-year-old daughter of a Palestinian father and a Dutch mother. Sonia is an actress living in London. After the breakdown of a disastrous love affair with a married man, Sonia decides to visit her older sister, Haneen, living in Haifa. Haneen is a professor at a Tel Aviv university. Years have elapsed since Sonia’s last visit to her ancestral homeland. In the interim, she has married, divorced, and remains focused on her acting career. Sonia is not very likeable as a character. She is conceited, self-absorbed, and with an interiority that is prolonged and tedious.
A return to her family’s Palestinian homeland conjures mixed emotions in Sonia and revives snatches of long since buried memories. Her relationship with her sister is strained. Their communication falters, stutters, and stumbles, with neither one initially willing to open up. Enter Haneen’s friend, Miriam. Miriam is a charismatic theatre director currently in the throes of putting together an Arabic production of Hamlet in the West Bank. She is in need of someone to play the roles of Gertrude and Ophelia and turns to Sonia for help. Reluctantly, Sonia agrees to read for the two parts until Miriam is able to find a permanent replacement. Sonia meets the rest of the cast and finds herself increasingly drawn into the production until she finally agrees to play the roles of Gertrude and Ophelia.
The narrative alternates between the rehearsals and interactions of the actors; their competing egos and shifting allegiances; probes into the craft of acting; Sonia’s interiority as she begins the slow process of understanding the challenges of living in occupied land; her interrogation of her family’s role in the Palestinian resistance; and her increasing emotional and intellectual investment in the play’s success. Against this backdrop, Hamad shows how even something as simple as travel is fraught with tension because of Israeli military check-points, interrogations, and the fear of and humiliations inflicted by Israel soldiers. Add to that the challenges of producing a play while navigating the political landscape, juggling funding issues, dealing with infiltrators who spy on those involved in the production, intermittent road closures, and theatre closures. These occur against a back drop of demonstrations, tear gas, and civilian killings. In spite of a haunting fear the Israeli authorities can close down the production at a whim, the players show a fierce determination to persevere.
The selection of Hamlet is perceptive. The ghost haunting Hamlet becomes a metaphor for the ghosts haunting Sonia’s past. Just as Hamlet puts on a play to force Claudius to confront his guilt, the actors stage their production of Hamlet to similarly confront their oppressors. Hamlet’s description of Denmark as a prison resonates with its Palestinian audience, especially when Israeli soldiers menacingly approach the stage in full view of audience and actors. The play represents art as resistance. It assumes the role of a powerful tool courageously entering the political arena to resist oppression.
The novel’s strength lies in its ability to illustrate the fear and exhausting struggles of Palestinians living under occupation. Their determination to keep their cultural activities alive in spite of the numerous obstacles they face is highly commendable. Isabella Hammad’s ability to capture their struggle with skill and objectivity is worthy of praise.