“Water is a potent force in Howl, periodically gushing down onto Kaseki’s head from a suspended pail, causing her face to squash into a wince and her body to sag. A shiny square on the floor becomes a pool in which she embarrassedly confronts her reflection. In the end, she’s caught in a no-win ordeal, trying to scrub the floor dry with her long robe, then wringing the water out. We laugh—she’s the naive clown, the holy fool who often appears in butoh—but in the wake of hurricanes we feel the hopelessness of her task.”
– Deborah Jowitt, “Fields of Battle”, Voice Choices, 2005
