The Visit

When Claire announces that she has come to Guellen to buy justice, the Mayor states, “Justice can’t be bought.” Claire replies, “Everything can be bought” (36). Although the Mayor and the town protest when she announces her demand, she demonstrates over the next few days that her statement is true. Just as she became a sex worker when she was desperate, the townspeople are desperate enough to sell themselves. The structures that serve as the pillars that hold up their society—justice, democracy, and religion—crumble for the sake of money. In the second act, when Ill notices that his fellow citizens are spending more money and recognizes this as a threat, he turns to the three institutions that ought to protect him. He goes to the Policeman, the Mayor, and the Priest. None of them help him. In fact, all three of them have guns, and the first two are vaguely threatening. The Priest finally acknowledges that Ill is in danger, but instead of helping him, he blames Ill for being a temptation and begs him to leave town, knowing that the temptation will eventually grow too strong. Religion fails, and Claire becomes a god. During the second act, she sits on the balcony and looms over the townspeople. She either releases a black panther or allows her panther to escape, bringing out the aggression of the townspeople as well as their guns. Playing as a god, Claire has orchestrated Guellen’s financial predicament by buying up the town and shutting down industry. She is, by her claim, unkillable, which means that she is too strong to be defeated. Claire is a vengeful god, and she knows her demands will be satisfied. Even the church has submitted to her temptation.

The structure of law and the justice system are first unsettled by the revelation of the 45-year-old injustice that Ill perpetrated against Claire. He perverted the legal process by bribing witnesses to lie, buying his way out of due justice for the price of a pint of brandy. Ill wronged Claire, and her demand for justice is legitimate. She has returned with wealth to buy her own justice, just as Ill did, which has a sense of symmetry and equalizing. But the justice system doesn’t function on retribution. Ill’s crime not only ruined Claire’s reputation and forced her into a life of sex work but also led to their baby’s death. If the baby had stayed with her parents, she likely wouldn’t have been exposed to meningitis and might have lived. Ill’s transgression was egregious, but Claire’s version of justice is extralegal, requiring the town’s law enforcement to look the other way while a man is killed. Her punishment of the two false witnesses was brutally violent, and certainly not permissible by any legal system. Conversely, her two henchmen are murderers who were convicted and sentenced to death, and Claire managed to offer enough money to buy them, undermining the integrity of the entire justice system. Guellen is located in a country (possibly Switzerland) that does not have the death penalty. But Claire has sentenced Ill to death, and her money makes it happen. If justice can be bought, the system is destabilized and destroyed.

The Mayor is the first to declare that as a Humanist town, they would not be taking Claire’s offer, but his indignation is short-lived. There seems to be some corruption in the democratic system already when the Mayor promises Ill that he can be the next mayor. Ill even attempts to use “future-mayor” clout to coerce the Policeman to help him. But the Mayor takes away the future mayorship just as quickly, punishing Ill for a 45-year-old crime that no one questioned until it came between the town and a million pounds. To carry out Claire’s “justice,” the town must be united. It’s tacitly democratic and must be unanimous. None of them want to kill Ill, but they’re all quietly ready to allow murder to happen. But they’re also ready to force any dissenters to stay silent, as some of the townsmen show up to prevent Ill (or anyone) from telling the press about the true bargain being struck. The workings of the justice system become warped because the townspeople and leaders want money badly enough to let Claire invent her own form of justice. They know it’s wrong, and they insist they won’t let it happen, even as they are already spending the money. At the end of the play, Ill accepts his fate and decides to comply with the town’s vote. The Mayor tries to convince him to kill himself and save them the trouble, but Ill insists on making the town bear the burden of voting for his death. Before voting, the Mayor asks each of the town’s institutions if they have any questions, and none of them speak. The vote, which is notably about whether to accept the money, not whether to kill Ill, is unanimous, with only Ill voting no. This suggests a failure of democracy, as the most popular decision isn’t always right, and the person who is most affected by the vote is vastly outnumbered by those who only benefit. By dangling wealth over the townspeople’s heads, Claire manages to break down Guellen’s principles and corrupt their structures of right and wrong.