Pet Sematary

Rachel is Louis’s wife and the only living child of her wealthy parents, who dote upon her. She is intelligent and passionate, and especially keyed into Louis’s thoughts. She is also stubborn; she only seems to apologize after she has gotten her way. She acts as the caretaker for the Creed household, a fact that irritates her parents, who believe she deserves better than Louis Creed. Indeed, Louis often looks at Rachel’s sensitivity and empathy with paternalistic awe, as one might regard a child.

Rachel’s sensitivity is especially palpable when it comes to death, as she had been traumatized when she was 8 years old by the grisly death of her sister, Zelda: “She never had been easy around the appearances of death […] probably because of her sister. Rachel’s sister had died very young, and it had left a scar which Louis had learned early in their marriage not to touch” (31). Rachel’s older sister, Zelda, died of meningitis but the ramifications of this death continue to haunt Rachel for the rest of her life. To say that Rachel is uncomfortable about and around death would be an understatement; Rachel finds the fact of death terrifying, and something that should be hidden from her children at all costs. Rachel’s fear of death sharply contrasts with Louis’s rational thinking about it; however, this fear also foreshadows the horror to come. Rachel’s fear of death seems to extend to a subconscious fear of the undead, and so she works to prevent Louis from resurrecting Gage, even though she is not actually sure of what he is doing. This fear of death also ends up being Rachel’s undoing, as she returns to Ludlow to check on Louis, fearful for his life, and is killed by the reanimated Gage.

Ellie is Rachel and Louis’s 5-year-old daughter who starts kindergarten at the beginning of the novel. She is described as a relatively happy child. Although she does have tantrums, “most of the time, Ellie was what she had always been—a dear”(19). Ellie loves her cat, Church, very much and is often annoyed at her younger brother, Gage. At the beginning of the novel, Ellie is a lot like Louis and they get along swimmingly for that reason. Louis reflects that Ellie “was wary of giving too much of herself away. It was a trait Louis admired” (35). Ellie reflects a lot on her experiences and seems to constantly be observing the actions and speech of the people around her. Like her parents, Ellie can be quite headstrong, such as being upset at the idea that God would take away her cat from her.

As the novel progresses, and Louis makes more and more mistakes, Ellie’s behavior starts to resemble Rachel’s fear of death, rather than Louis’s rational approach to it. After Gage dies, Ellie begins to have horrifying nightmares that foreshadow Louis’s later actions. She withdraws into herself, as she no longer feels protected by the adults around her. When Louis takes Ellie and Rachel to the airport:

he expected an argument, perhaps even an Ellie-style tantrum […] But there was only that pallid, disquieting silence which seemed so deep. He could have asked her more but found he didn’t dare; she had already told him more than he perhaps wanted to hear (292).

Here, we see the deviation from Ellie’s normal and childish behavior. The trauma of her brother’s death and the lack of support she receives from her parents causes Ellie to turn inward, as she no longer trusts the people around her. Ellie represents how Louis’s actions have lifelong consequences, just as the actions of Rachel’s parents have spawned her trauma. In trying to prevent Ellie from confronting death, Louis has ensured that her childhood will be marked by death in the same way that her mother’s childhood was.

Gage Creed is the 2-year-old son of Rachel and Louis. He seems relatively happy as a toddler although his life has been marked by sickness. When he was younger, Louis and Rachel feared that Gage was encephalic, although the concern proved untrue. In the first section of the book, Gage almost dies by choking on his own vomit, which makes Rachel and Louis consider how close they all are to death at all times. Like any child, he also puts things in his mouth, like Ellie’s marbles, which Louis is surprised to find he does not choke on. The audience exclusively sees Gage through Louis’s eyes and there is the indication that Louis and Rachel, like most other parents, would do anything for their children, thereby foreshadowing Louis’s action of resurrecting Gage. Gage is usually associated with the grave and dirt, as in the early premonition Louis has about Gage’s death. Although Gage is not what most would consider to be a fully fleshed-out character, his death is the central event of the novel and shapes and defines the future of his family. Of course, Gage comes back wrong, and as a monster, so Louis has no choice but to kill him.

Jud is the Creed family’s 83-year-old neighbor. He has a thick Down East accent and enjoys smoking Chesterfield cigarettes and drinking beer. Jud serves as Louis’s surrogate father up until his death in the second section. Louis “called [Jud] a friend, as a grown man must do when he finds the man who should have been his father relatively late in life” (3). Because Louis lost his father at an early age and has a terrible relationship with his father-in-law, Louis looks to Jud as a surrogate father, a male role model that Louis has never had. Unfortunately, this bond allows for Louis to be blinded by the power that draws Jud back to the MicMac burial ground.

Jud showcases one of Louis’s greatest flaws: his ability to be manipulated. Even though Jud attempts to prevent Louis from reinterring Gage, Jud has already committed himself as a servant of the burial ground, a betrayal to the very nature of life that Louis does not understand. However, Jud understands how he has betrayed Louis and why he is partially to blame, as Jud understands the power of the burial ground in ways that Louis cannot believe. In contrast to Louis’s perception of his own agency, then, Jud understands his limitations as a human being and fully believes that there are powers greater than ourselves that dictate our actions. More than anything, Jud seems to exist as a kind of messenger of fate, especially considering his nearly prophetic powers. Louis remarks that “it was eerie, the way Jud seemed almost to know what had transpired this morning, both on the telephone and in his own head” (136). Jud knows Louis better than Louis perhaps knows himself. In many ways, Jud almost seems to be a much older and more haggard version of Louis, a Louis who has been around and seen some things he cannot possibly explain. In this way, Jud does seem to represent a sort of father figure for Louis, although, like Louis himself, Jud ultimately only leads the Creed family down the path of destruction.

Church, short for Winston Churchill, is the Creed family’s cat and closest to Ellie in the family. Church has one ragged ear and paw which differentiates him from many other cats and also perhaps foreshadows his fate. In the first section, Church represents the proximity to violence that humans try to forget. When Louis thinks about cats as a species and a pet, he reflects:

Cats lived violent lives and often died bloody deaths, always just below the usual range of human sight. Here was Church, dozing in the sun […] Church who slept peacefully on his daughter’s bed every night […] And yet Louis had seen him stalk a bird with a broken wing, his green eyes sparkling with curiosity and [...] cold delight […] Cats were the gangsters of the animal world, living outside the law and often dying there (37).

Even though cats are pets, they are a little bit of outlaws as far as companion animals are concerned, often toeing the line between feral and domesticated. Before he is neutered, Church has the ability to cross the barrier between these two environments, representing some sort of subconscious pull towards danger that human beings often try to forget exists. Church is the first of the Creed family to die, thereby refuting the idea that the Creed family is special and somehow protected from death. After Church is resurrected, he loses all of his previous grace and even seems stupid: “He lies around the house all day and looks at[Louis] with those strange, muddy eyes—as if he’d seen something that had blasted away most of whatever intelligence a cat has” (158-59). More than anything, Church represents a warning of what can happen when humans attempt to play God. Church serves as a reminder to Louis of the terrible horrors brought about by humankind’s hubris.