Prospero

I've featured the whole of this huge sculpture of Prospero and Ariel (characters from Shakespeare's play "The Tempest") as a blipfoto journal entry before.  It's one of the first things you notice about Old Broadcasting House, as you approach its entrance from Regent Street.  I caught it at exactly the right moment this afternoon, as the sun was highlighting Prospero's face perfectly.  Ariel was chosen by the Board of Governors in 1929 to represent the BBC's broadcasts over the airwaves because he is an invisible airy spirit, and also because of the pun on the word aerial.  Prospero, whom I have zoomed in on here, is a less meaningful character in broadcasting symbolism, though the sculpture's creator Eric Gill said:  ‘Had not Prospero power over the immortal gods? At any rate it seemed to be only right and proper that I should see the matter in as bright a light as possible and so I took it upon me to portray God the father and God the son. For even if that were not Shakespeare’s meaning it ought to be the BBC’s’.  Hmmmm...


Prospero is also the name of the online newspaper for retired BBC staff, which contains news about pensions, former colleagues and developments at the BBC.  It is exactly 6 weeks to the day until I become a pensioner myself (!!), so the name Prospero has begun to figure in my mind lately as I discover ways to keep in touch with what's happening at the BBC after I've left.  I also found out that there is a volunteer visiting scheme for retired staff.  A 'listening ear' for people over 70, those recently bereaved, and anyone in poor health, the scheme covers the UK and visitors are BBC pensioners themselves - so whether you are visited or become a volunteer visitor yourself, you will instantly have your memories of life at the Beeb as something in common.  I like that, as it's very much in the spirit of the rather more avuncular BBC that I first joined as a school-leaver in 1977.