Exploitation and Love in The Violent Bear it Away

One of the things I've been noticing throughout this story is the constant exploitation of children by the adults around them. Both of the central adult figures (Mason and Rayber) treat children not as individuals, but as things to be molded into reproductions of themselves. Mason's exploitative attitude towards children is obvious from the beginning and is remunerated throughout the story: he seems to need an impressionable template on which to imprint his ideas. His first attempt at this self-reproduction (kidnapping Rayber) is a failure, so, years later, he kidnaps Tarwater, a boy who has no real parents to claim him or give him love. Because of the conditions of his conception, Tarwater is a perfect disciple for Mason, whose satisfaction in life derives solely from his belief that his "work" will be continued by the boy after death.

Rayber is no better in his attitude towards Tarwater, and children in general. Like Mason, Rayber sees the boy not as an innocent in need of love and support, but more like a lump of wet clay, ready to be remade in whatever image satisfies his own insecurities but somewhat resistant: in need of a firm hand. When Tarwater arrives at Rayber's door, Rayber does not give him comfort or love (perhaps the essential elements of a healthy childhood), but instead immediately begins insinuating his own worldview into the boys mind and telling him he will be "free." Like Mason, Rayber's idea of individuality has nothing to do with independence, but is instead only a mask disguising an urge to recreate himself, a narcissistic impulse that is also self-loathing: Rayber sees, in Tarwater, a chance to create himself as he should have been, without their mutual uncle's "corrupting" influence. This feeling is not unique to Tarwater; Rayber admits wanting a child from the "welfare woman" for the purposes of raising it to his specifications, not because of any innate need for love or family. At the Pentecostal meeting, the young-girl preacher, whom Rayber recognizes as being exploited by her parents, causes him to experience a vision of himself whisking all the supposedly-exploited children of the world away to a place where outside minds cannot influence them, except his, of course.

The boy Bishop, however, throws a wrench into this rotation of exploitation-escape-exploitation. Because he is "slow," Bishop is beyond exploitation: he cannot be molded or rewrought, he is a true individual in the isolation of his condition. It is because of this that Rayber experiences the "hated love" for his son that "gripped him and held him in a vice." Because Bishop is beyond exploitation, he becomes an irresistible receptacle for genuine love: a caring and comfort without need of recompense or recognition. This is the love that Tarwater needs (and which Rayber needed, as shown by the brief stories of his childhood), but does not receive by either of the adults in his life. If he had received any earnest, unconditional love in his life, if he had known a place in the world where he was wanted and not just needed, perhaps he would not have to struggle to find his place within the world. I believe Bishop is a symbol of love, a being that asks for nothing and gives only kindness, with no thought of consequence.

On a side note, I find it interesting that Bishop was in fact baptised and reborn in his father's attempt to drown him. I don't really know what to make of that in relation to Mason's/Tarwater's need to baptise him, but maybe someone else can shed some light?