Geri Halliwell says being told her dad had died during an English class woke her up to her “mortality”.

The 51-year-old singer’s father Laurence died from a heart attack in 1993, a year before Geri joined the Spice Girls and in a new interview she said she “ironically” learned of his death during a lesson William Shakespeare’s ‘Hamlet’ – which tells of the titular Prince of Denmark’s anguish when his uncle slaughters his father and marries his mother.

Geri told the Sunday Times: “They pulled me out of the English class to say my father was dead, which was so ironic.

“It suddenly woke me up to my own mortality. Before a parent dies, there’s a person standing between you and your own death. It woke me up. I call it death energy.”

Geri also said she thinks her dad’s death gave her ambition, saying: “It was my gas in the tank.”

The singer, who has daughter Bluebell, 17, with film director Sacha Gervasi, 57, and six-year-old son Monty with her Formula 1 boss husband Christian Horner, 49, was hit by another loss in November 2021 when her brother Max died suddenly aged 54.

A Hertfordshire Constabulary spokesperson confirmed about his passing: “Police were called at 9.40am on Wednesday 17 November to report the concern for (the) welfare of a man at a residential property in Berkhamsted.

“Officers, along with the East of England Ambulance Service, attended the scene. The man was located and taken to hospital for treatment, where he sadly later died.”

Geri was reportedly abroad in the Middle East with her husband Christian at the time of her brother’s death.

A spokesperson for her said at the time: “As you can imagine this is a difficult time and we would ask that you respect the family’s privacy at this time.”

Geri also told in her Times chat she has such a love of books she wants to return to education and study English Literature, despite it being a reminder of her dad’s death.