Burning Benedict (Flock Theatre Reinvents Ritual Sacrifice for New London)
My Facebook feed this week has been full of things like these:
"Don't you remember the 6th of September when Arnold came to town?
He took the buildings one by one
And burnt them to the ground
And burnt them to the ground."
This is because the Flock Theatre (or better still, their FACEBOOK PAGE!) has begun what they hope will be an annual tradition of New London's Schooner Festival of burning the traitor Benedict Arnold in effigy. This year it was theatrical fire, but they are working with the fire department and the EPA to use REAL FLAMES next year.
There were folks dressed up in period cloths (OH, THOSE COATS), carrying rifles, wearing tricorn hats or little mobcaps.
There was Satan on stilts. There were those strange Mustache Fusileers puppet people. There were Morris Men and hoop dancers. There was the traitor's effigy, double-faced, mounted on a wagon. The word "Traitor" hung about his neck. He held the mask of a skull in one hand, a mirror in the other.
There was dancing. All the red coats and the militia men in their dreamy brown coats and the mobcap girls and the hoop dancers and Morris men and all of US too, gathered there to watch. How we danced. To songs like Billy Joel's "We Didn't Start the Fire" and Johnny Cash's "Ring of Fire" and also a song called, I believe, "Disco Inferno." Among others.
And then Michael Langois stood up, rifle in arm, and recited the poem (which I do believe he wrote?) about Benedict Arnold burning New London to the ground, all those centuries ago.
"And now," he shouted, full of glee and solemnity, "we'll burn HIM to the ground! We'll burn HIM to the ground."
And then, with red silk and wind and light, they did.
***
My father read a book once by philosopher Rene Girard called I See Satan Fall Like Lightning. It was all about anthropology and mimetic desire and social scapegoating. Some of that informs the way I watched Benedict burn last night (insofar as I understood any of it, which was not much).
...It was probably more informed by that movie from the 70's Wicker Man.
...And the fact that once I watched them burn Guy Fawkes in effigy in Neil Gaiman's backyard. And how everyone booed him to ash, except Gene Wolfe, who is very proud to be Catholic. And there were firecrackers. And I looked away only once from the bonfire, and that is when Guy's pumpkin head did fall.
Anyway.
This whole effigy thing stirs old things in me. I think we might be hardwired for this kind of ritual. And I think the Flock Theatre knows it. And I think that it's going to turn into a big annual bonfire indeed. And I am planning to be there, dancing around it.
Even though I'm not really into the "vengeance script" as Sita calls it. Still - why not dance with Satan on stilts if you have the chance?
I wrote a little ditty in honor of Flock Theater, and my thoughts of effigies.
All our little wicker men
Fawkes to Arnold, back again
How glorious at summer's end
To burn the wickedest of men
And better still a traitor he
We burn in solemn effigy
He used to be the summer king
Whose death in winter heralds spring
***
"Don't you remember the 6th of September when Arnold came to town?
He took the buildings one by one
And burnt them to the ground
And burnt them to the ground."
This is because the Flock Theatre (or better still, their FACEBOOK PAGE!) has begun what they hope will be an annual tradition of New London's Schooner Festival of burning the traitor Benedict Arnold in effigy. This year it was theatrical fire, but they are working with the fire department and the EPA to use REAL FLAMES next year.
There were folks dressed up in period cloths (OH, THOSE COATS), carrying rifles, wearing tricorn hats or little mobcaps.
There was Satan on stilts. There were those strange Mustache Fusileers puppet people. There were Morris Men and hoop dancers. There was the traitor's effigy, double-faced, mounted on a wagon. The word "Traitor" hung about his neck. He held the mask of a skull in one hand, a mirror in the other.
There was dancing. All the red coats and the militia men in their dreamy brown coats and the mobcap girls and the hoop dancers and Morris men and all of US too, gathered there to watch. How we danced. To songs like Billy Joel's "We Didn't Start the Fire" and Johnny Cash's "Ring of Fire" and also a song called, I believe, "Disco Inferno." Among others.
And then Michael Langois stood up, rifle in arm, and recited the poem (which I do believe he wrote?) about Benedict Arnold burning New London to the ground, all those centuries ago.
"And now," he shouted, full of glee and solemnity, "we'll burn HIM to the ground! We'll burn HIM to the ground."
And then, with red silk and wind and light, they did.
***
My father read a book once by philosopher Rene Girard called I See Satan Fall Like Lightning. It was all about anthropology and mimetic desire and social scapegoating. Some of that informs the way I watched Benedict burn last night (insofar as I understood any of it, which was not much).
...It was probably more informed by that movie from the 70's Wicker Man.
...And the fact that once I watched them burn Guy Fawkes in effigy in Neil Gaiman's backyard. And how everyone booed him to ash, except Gene Wolfe, who is very proud to be Catholic. And there were firecrackers. And I looked away only once from the bonfire, and that is when Guy's pumpkin head did fall.
Anyway.
This whole effigy thing stirs old things in me. I think we might be hardwired for this kind of ritual. And I think the Flock Theatre knows it. And I think that it's going to turn into a big annual bonfire indeed. And I am planning to be there, dancing around it.
Even though I'm not really into the "vengeance script" as Sita calls it. Still - why not dance with Satan on stilts if you have the chance?
I wrote a little ditty in honor of Flock Theater, and my thoughts of effigies.
All our little wicker men
Fawkes to Arnold, back again
How glorious at summer's end
To burn the wickedest of men
And better still a traitor he
We burn in solemn effigy
He used to be the summer king
Whose death in winter heralds spring
***