My initial reaction to this play was one of disgust. Which isn’t to say I didn’t like it as a play, but after reading Buried Child, I felt naseous and ansty and itchy… which, frankly is odd, because I eat up this crazy twisted shit all the time. I’m not really sure what set off my disgust… Incest baby? Mummified, unburied incest baby? Finger rape? I think it was a combination.
The rabbits my mom raises are almost all born of mother/son coupling. As long as you don’t mate brother/sister, you won’t get any weird genetic crap. With rabbits, sons humping away at their mothers is A-okay!
BUT THESE ARE HUMANS. OH GOD. Don’t give me any of that “Maybe it’s metaphorical incest” crap. If you need convincing that it’s an incest baby, head over to Christine’s Journal, where she collected a disturbing amount of quotes.
There’s a sick part of me that is slightly curious to know who initiated. Was it Halie, who had not been touched by her husband for several years? Or was it Tilden, who I’m guessing didn’t have much interaction with the ladies? I’m more likely to guess Halie, because frankly she seems like the type to come on to forbidden people. A man of the cloth, her own son, you know, stuff like that. Then again, she does say of Tilden: “He never listens to me Dodge. He’s never listened to me in the past.” Maybe Tilden didn’t listen when she told him “No.” And then you get Incest Baby.
All in all, I didn’t particularly like any of the characters in this play. I hated them as people, but as characters I found them all pretty fascinating. Especially when you get into the symbolism and the parallels with Arthur Miller plays. It gave me the distance I needed to appreciate the play.
~Jessie
P.S. Video for you! There was nothing good on Youtube for Buried Child, just a bunch of “previews” and no actual performances. So instead, I’ve found a video of the death scene of the terrifying creepy baby… thing… from the David Lynch movie Eraserhead. Be warned, this movie is probably the most effed up of David Lynch’s movies, and not for the faint of heart. The sounds that the “baby” makes alone is enough to give you nightmares. (For less effed up Lynch-ian shit, I recommend Elephant Man.)
YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!
