Book Review: DNA
This is probably one of the better plays that I have read this year. This play is now on the GCSE curriculum in UK schools. I had no expectations going into the play. I didn’t know what it was about, but I did know it was initially very well received. I can also understand why this play is in a school curriculum. The main characters are all school age, and they talk like the kids of today, so it is a drama that is relatable and deals with very real themes that kids go through.
The kids in this drama do something bad, nigh on unspeakable. A crime that is callous, driven more by a mob mentality, peer pressure and the insatiable need to fit in. To have community. To have friends. However, that is simply no excuse for their crimes. A group of children go into the woods, and all but one come out again. It is a dark look at power dynamics and how they can shift irrevocably, neither for the better nor for the worse. Call it survival of the fittest with a touch of psychopathy, it’s Lord of the Flies, it’s Black Mirror, it’s unhinged, and they’re children.
History has shown that even children do cruel things to other children. The characters in this play all react differently to the crime: The one who leads becomes a recluse, and one leans further into psychopathy, another becomes institutionalised. Nothing is normal, nothing will be the same again. But the shift in power dynamics is interesting, and it does say a lot about bullies. That they are all very insecure and desperate to feel important, included, at one with the world.
For anyone who has read ‘Cider with Rosie’ knows that childhood is supposed to be idyllic, free of cares and full of games, treats, jokes, laughter, family, and friends. There is an ‘otherness’ that happens at some point, before the play begins. And the place setting, I would argue, has a lot to do with it. The crime happens in the woods. If we think about folklore, the woods were always seen as other, unknown, and dangerous, as they are far from what is humanly familiar. It is the realm of the supernatural, of mythical creatures. The otherness of the woods, away from humanity, literally removes the humanity from the children. Think about Hansel and Gretel; they enter the woods to escape cruelty, but cruelty follows them into the woods, same with Little Red Riding Hood. Sleeping Beauty’s castle is literally enshrouded in a wood. The woods are where the monsters hide, or in these children's case, reveal the monsters within.
This is a really interesting play, one worth reading and one I would like to see on the stage. I do understand why this is a text for schools, and there is a lot to unpack. I would say GCSE is probably a little too simplistic for this type of play, as there are many angles to look at. Too many that can be unpacked in a 500-word book review.