The cathartic effect of collective mourning

I remember when Princess Diana died in 1997, I joined millions of other people in mourning her sudden, tragic loss. Those were the days before Facebook, so while the British set up camp in front of Buckingham Palace, the rest of us flocked to our TV sets to share in the collective mourning. I think I must have spent a whole week compulsively viewing every single documentary about her which was being shown on various channels in between the news footage and updates about the horrible crash. And I could not stop crying.

This, in itself, was a weird reaction on my part because it was not like I was such a Diana disciple - there were moments when I admired her, but at times she also used to, frankly, irritate me. I often found the constant media coverage of her every single move, along with the tabloid obsession with her love life, just a bit too much. So I even surprised myself with my emotional over-reaction; the only way I could explain it was that she was exactly the same age as me at the time she died, 36, and the shock of her death at such a relatively young age, shook me to the core. As cliché as it sounds, it really hit home how transient and fleeting life is – one minute she was this vibrant, beautiful woman, the mother of two boys, and the next, just like that, she was gone.

I eventually realised that another reason for the inexplicable sorrow I felt (the kind one usually reserves for the death of family members) was that I was going through the dumps at the time, and after the constant crying following news of the tragedy, I felt a kind of a cathartic relief: the news of her death had served to snap me out of my malaise. It was like someone had slapped me good and hard: after all, what was I doing moping around, when I was still young and healthy and life was there to be lived?

There are certain actors and celebrities with whom we have an affinity for personal reasons which others might not understand.

Fast forward 17 years later and here we are again, mourning the loss of another celebrity, this time not through a car accident but arguably through even sadder circumstances: suicide. This time, because of Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, the tragedy took on a different dimension as news instantly spread that Robin Williams, the much-loved comic actor, had taken his own life. Those who thronged to stand in the crowds after Diana’s death did so in order to find some solace and comfort through personal interaction with others who felt the same way. But this time, the collective public grief was more interactive as we shared snippets of our favourite films and quotes, connecting those of us who admired the actor in a way which only the Internet can make possible.

Of course, inevitably, there were those who took a dim, cynical view of this “jumping on the bandwagon” effect which seems to happen whenever someone famous dies. It is true that there was a whole day when our news feeds were crammed with numerous statuses about how Williams touched people with his films, his comedic genius, and the connection between comedians and depression. Yes, Pagliacci was mentioned more than once. And yet, I could perfectly understand why people felt the need to communicate their shock and sorrow over the demise of someone they only knew through the media.

We cannot overlook the fact that the reason it feels so personal when someone you have “grown up with” dies

Simply put, there are certain actors and celebrities with whom we have an affinity for personal reasons which others might not understand.

In Williams’s case, with a career in film which spans several generations, many were citing his milestones not only in terms of cinematic classics, but also because of the way the films coincided with specific turning points in their own lives. The fact that he suffered from clinical depression and as we have now learnt, was in the early stages of Parkinson’s disease, has made Williams’s life all the more poignant. It has got us talking about the black hole many find themselves in, hopefully making us more aware and understanding of those who suffer in silence and who need professional help.

And, of course, we cannot overlook the fact that the reason it feels so personal when someone you have “grown up with” dies, is because he/she represents that bittersweet part of your youth which fills you with a yearning nostalgia of a time which you can never go back to. As a child I remember wondering why my father would become so very silent and sad on hearing of the passing away of one of his favourite actors – it is only now that I can truly understand that the loss one feels is not only about the person we saw on the silver screen, but more tellingly, it is because we are mourning our own youth as we become more keenly aware of our own mortality.

If, by sharing this feeling of sorrow whether through the social media or other means, it helps us in some measure to connect with others who feel the same way, well, what is wrong with that?