Ian, a foul-mouthed middle-aged tabloid journalist has brought a young woman, Cate, to the room for the night.

A soldier unexpectedly enters the room brandishing a gun, and finds Cate has escaped through the bathroom window.

The soldier tells Ian about appalling atrocities that he has witnessed and taken part in, involving rape, torture and genocide, and says he has done everything as an act of revenge for the murder of his girlfriend.

The baby dies, and she buries it in a hole in the floorboards and leaves, but not before arguing with Ian about the utility or futility of praying during a burial.

Scene 5 consists of a series of brief images, showing Ian crying, masturbating and even hugging the dead soldier for comfort as he starves in the ruined room.

A major revival of the play, 15 years on from its debut, by contemporary of Sarah Kane and the Lyric's Artistic Director Sean Holmes.

As part of the Sarah Kane season with staged productions of Blasted, Crave and 4.48 Psychosis and semi-staged readings of Phaedra's Love and Cleansed.

[11] First original language production of the play in Austria, produced by Mental Eclipse Theater House in cooperation with Vienna theatre project.

[12][13] The initial performance was highly controversial and the play was fiercely attacked by most newspaper critics, many of whom regarded it as an attempt to shock the audience.

[14] However, critics have subsequently reassessed it; for example The Guardian's Michael Billington, who savaged the play in his first review, later recanted in the wake of Kane's suicide: "I got it wrong, as I keep saying.

"[15] After seeing a revival of the play, an Evening Standard reviewer Annie Ferguson wrote "How shrill and silly the 1995 hullabaloo and hysteria seemed last night when Blasted returned to the Royal Court.