I Killed My Mother by Andras Visky
Introduction:
This play which is set in post war Romania is indeed a powerful and wholly moving piece. It occurs during the times of the harsh dictatorship under Nicolae Ceaucescu and embodies the harshness under which Romanians had to live where this dictator was concerned. It also deals at length with the situation regarding the Roma minority who were constantly and consistently abused by the Romanian authorities.
There is also the shocking leitmotif of the abandonment of children in orphanages by their parents, children who were treated extremely badly by the authorities as several cases attested after the fall of communism. The main character who is Bernardette was abandoned by her mother at birth and left to rot in a state orphanage. She then meets her soul mate clip where she manages to kill her previous experiences and set them out of her mind even destroying her maternal bond so that her identity comes out accordingly.
As already mentioned Bernardette comes from the Roma minority which has been consistently abused over the years. The relationship with her soul mate clip is a crucial part of the play and demonstrates that one can actually kill people by blotting them out of their minds. The conditions inside the child orphanage are nothing less than horrendous and everything moves along at a brisk pace with not much time to think or do anything with the result that Bernardette feels almost consistently in a trance of her own. Visky skillfully intertwines various leitmotifs in the play including some aspects of the Romanian dictatorship and the ambivalence of the indigenous population towards the Roma minority. Some may also argue that these people deserve to undergoe unhappiness and ostracization rather in the manner of what happened to the Jews although it has to be admitted that that was a quite different genocide.
Bernardette is a strong willed character as she manages to rise almost like a phoenix out of the ashes to come to terms with herself and her intrinsic suffering which can only be described as horrendous in all quarters.
Reception for the play:
Tom Williams writing in The Chicago Critic (2010) has some mixed feelings about the play although he does say that much of the plot was ‘lost in translation’. Here is what he sums it up as:
“Maybe too much was lost in the play’s translation from Romanian to English (translation by Alisha O’Sullivan) as I found the work wordy and much too poetic to be coherent. While I was impressed with the weird movement and unique staging, Bernadette’s story was presented in a surreal, abstract, almost absurdest style. Scenes like Bernadette and her muse-the imaginary Clip, being punished by having metal clips place on their tongues for hours allowed the boy and girl to invent a new language-”clip”-a sort of pig Latin”.
It is this surrealism however which makes Visky’s work attractive to those who can understand it. In some ways it is similar to some bizarre Kafka scenario such as the book, ‘The Castle’ where the inhabitants inhabit their own surreal world which is full of intrinsic subplots and hidden double meanings. Yet again one feels that Visky is trying to send a message here, one which perhaps strikes to the heart and depicts the terrible plight of the Roma people.
Other reviews of the play are also instructive. Brian Nemtusak in Theatre appears to be hard hit by the raw emotional power of the piece and he finds several poetic influences in the proceedings:
“It’s hard not to raise an eyebrow at the Randian overtones or existential masochism of the thesis. But Hungarian playwright-poet Visky’s expressionist response to parentless hardship does things no docudrama could. Couching Bernadette’s spiritual progress as an ongoing dialogue with Clip (Livingston)—first as mentor/playmate/protector then internalized voice—the play explodes into a full-on dramatic poem, unfolding one epiphany after another”.
The poetic aspect of the piece is perhaps overlooked and is one of the major strong points of the play. Nemtusak also argues that the play is less concerned with what he calls ‘Ceaucescu’s Children’ than the actual plight of the Roma minority although that is also arguable. Still the poetic aspect has a lot going for it and this is perhaps one of the finest aspects of the play. The cries of help which are subtly yet distinctly characterized feature quite prominently
The character of Clip is also perhaps overlooked. He is what can be described as Bernardette’s alter ego and as the play progresses his influence continues to be greater and greater with the result that by the end, he has complete command over Bernardette who is powerless in every way to resist his entreaties which are consistently louder and more incessant. Take this passage as a typical example:
"Turn your back, Bernadette, and don't look around.
That's it. Don't ruin it, don't look around. Let her scream.
She's screaming! She screams that she's my mother. I'm your mother, Bernadette, I'm your mother.
Let her, let her scream. Don't look back. Say it now. With your fingers, your hair, your teeth, your bones, your blood vessels, your cells, bowels, with everything, everything, with all your being, say it with as much power as a walnut tree."
This perhaps is one of the most powerful passages in the play and apart from exhibiting a certain cruelty, it is also pretty much realistic in every sense. Here Clip is, in a way hypnotizing Bernardette to get rid of her mother in her thoughts and feelings and the language used is very graphic and incessantly descriptive. Interestingly Clip is making an entreaty to Bernardette to use every fibre of her body to blot out her mother from her life, the mother who abandoned her to this hell and who left her to rot away. Only through the complete disavowal of her mother will Bernardette by completely free from the horrors which surround her, only then can she start living her life again as a normal human being without fears and/or unhappiness. It is indeed a passage of brutal power yet it is also realistic in the sense that the therapeutic process which Bernardette has to go through is intrinsically important for her very survival.
In another review, Zac Thompson is also extremely descriptive and actually compares Vlisky to Dickens in what can only be a supreme tribute:
“At a Romanian orphanage that could have been co-designed by Charles Dickens and Samuel Beckett, a fierce, discarded Gypsy girl strikes up a sustaining friendship with a wild, imaginative boy nicknamed Clip after the steel device the authorities clamp onto his tongue whenever he speaks out of turn. The business of becoming an adult amidst brutality and meaninglessness is the principal subject of Andras Visky's fascinating two-hander, but the play's bleak landscape never overpowers the playwright's fundamental humanity”.
Thompson concludes that humanity is the overriding element of the story and this is definitely the case. For Bernardette is cleansed by her relationship with Clip who manages to strike into her inner self and continually finds new and subtle nuances to the continual progress of the characters. As in other more celebrated plays, Vlisky turns to redemption and eventual forgiveness as his main strong points although one can argue that redemption may be far away in some of the statements made by Bernardette.
Conclusion – a truly powerful play with much rewarding scenarios
Vlisky is truly a master playwright and in’I Killed My Mother’ he has definitely excelled himself. The sheer power of the monologues both by Clip and Bernardette demonstrate a touching rawness which is difficult to actually perceive yet one is never far away from what is happening in real life. Vlisky also creates awareness on the shocking conditions inside Romanian orphanages and the brutal complicity of the state with such proceedings. In a sense the play is an indictment on what actually went on inside these hell holes and shows us that no one can really be sure that the horrors inside these orphanages were actually happening. The play is surely one of the most powerful to come out of Vlisy’s pen and demonstrates the power of drama as a social force.
References:
Thompson Z; I Killed my Mother, review; Retrieved from: http://www.chicagoreader.com/chicago/Event?oid=1410893 The Chicago Reader 2010
Tom Williams; I Killed my Mother, review; Retrieved from: http://chicagocritic.com/i-killed-my-mother/ The Chicago Critic 2010
Hungarian Theatre of Cluj; I Killed my Mother; Retrieved from: http://www.biletmaster.ro/eng/Production/360043/I-Killed-My-Mother 2011
Ferenc Visky, The Foolishness of God. Cluj: Koinónia Publishing, 2010
