A Live Bird in Its Jaws

Ian C. Nelson is Assistant Director of Libraries, University of
Saskatchewan; and Director, Saskatoon Gateway Plays, Regina Summer
Stage, and La Troupe du Jour.

With only two plays—Un Reel Ben Beau, Ben Triste, in 1981 and Un
Oiseau Vivant dans la Gueule in 1987—Jeanne-Mance Delisle has, in the
words of Guy Rogers, “confirmed her[self] as one of the most important
and original voices in Québec.” (The latter play won the Governor
General’s Literary Award for French drama.) Delisle’s theatre is
challenging and not for the squeamish. The title is explained by the
following exchange: “‘The bird is bad omen?’ ‘It’s your
penis.’ ‘What would my penis be doing in some pig’s mouth?’
‘The usual.’”

Although Delisle belongs to the contemporary branch of Québécois
theatre concerned with words and characters (the realm of Tremblay,
Dubois, and Laberge), she has written into this play significant and
provocative elements from populist, imagistic theatre, of which Robert
Lepage and Le Cirque du Soleil are the principal exponents. A Live Bird
in Its Jaws is a Freudian soup, or rather a bouillabaisse, for whole
chunks of imagery and symbolism are brought to the surface in each
ladle. In fact, Delisle characterizes each scene with a specific symbol.

The imagery is disturbing and often violent. Sexuality is blatant: in
this case, a triangle between two 30-year-old twin brothers and a woman
who is writing a play. The bisexual combinations have particular
prominence, but the interior play in development brings many more
complications along with the sibling incest. The original and subsequent
(French and English) productions of this play probably owe much to a
peculiar maturity and daring, as the actions portrayed and
described—even with the safety of theatrical conventions of suspension
of belief and stylization—are explicit.

Despite strong mother-father-egg symbolism throughout, I am surprised
not yet to have read any critical analysis pointing out a thread of
penetration images, beginning with a pinprick and going so far as
on-stage sodomy. The point here is that the author is exalting specific
nonprocreative acts in a context out of which grows a play that is
fabulous in the original sense of that word. This is perhaps not
surprising if, as Guy Rogers states in the introduction, the author
“is outraged by the Catholic legacy of a school system that
systematically repressed sexuality [and] believes that the fundamental
base of education should be emotional and sexual expression.” This
play is uncompromising and will provoke much discussion.