Five Theses on Torture

In Idelber Avelar’s The Five Theses on Torture, the author expands upon the relationship between torture and language. As the topic for my essay, I automatically thought back to Elaine Scarry’s argument on how torture shapes one’s language, self and world. In the end, the torturer is really the physical entity of a voice which is the key component in torturing the victim who is just a physical entity. In Page Dubois’ text, the victim is of course not merely a physical entity but a physical entity with which contains alethia or the truth that remains hidden until uncovered.  The relationship between language and torture continues to play a prominent theme not just in The Five Theses on Torture but in other works as well. In Death and the Maiden, Dr. Miranda’s voice tortures Paulina for years even after the physical torture has ended. Language plays a vital role in all torture. Especially since torture entails a pain so overwhelming that it compels the victim to scream and lose all ability to utilize language as a possible means to escape the torture or make sense of it. Paulina even goes so far as to remember specific dialogues she has with Dr. Miranda, again emphasizing the power of language and voice with regards to torture. 

Response to Five Theses on Torture

            In his fourth thesis, Avelar criticizes Dorfman’s film version of Death and the Maiden.  He states that the film takes the presupposition of the sameness of confession and truth: “The film is dedicated to imagining a scene of truth, as nothing other than a scene of confession.”  Indeed, we are meant to believe that Miranda’s final confession is the real truth and that all of his alibis and excuses are merely lies meant to distract us.  Paulina keeps pushing Miranda until he confesses to what she wants to hear and what she believes is the truth.  This parallels the Greek thought about torture and slaves that we read in DuBois’ text – how the ancient Athenians took the confession of slaves under torture as a truth that could not be false.  Paulina puts Miranda through basanos she creates to uncover the alethia she believes is within.  Indeed, Paulina is so convinced of Miranda’s guilt that when her husband, Gerardo, asks her what she will do if Miranda is innocent and has nothing to confess, she replies “then we’re all fucked.”  Paulina does not care whether or not Miranda’s confession is the truth for him or not, she merely wants it to be the truth for her.  When he confesses, she is satisfied that she has now uncovered the alethia that was there all along, waiting to be found.  Like DuBois describes, she is confident that basanos always leads to the truth, which is revealed through the confession of the one under torture.

Response to Five Theses on Torture

The Five Theses on Torture by Idelber Avelar focuses on the representation of torture by names, the connection between torture and the voice of those who are involved, understanding the narratives of the victims of torture, the relationship between torture and confession, and torture and truth. The first thesis about the naming of torturous "events" was incredibly interesting to me. I've never thought about the importance of naming in relation to torture in the sense that a name like Apartheid implies that it was a singular event of racism and that now that it is over, large-scale racism is over. While this realization made me uncomfortable, I do see the logic in that Apartheid is taught as history instead of an example of an ongoing issue. We've talked about the importance of a name and language in relation to torture throughout the class, but all of it has been more individualistic or the opposite, very broad, but this was interesting because names like Apartheid and the Holocaust are so embedded into education. However, I wish the author had proposed a solution to this issue. I can understand the author's point about why the naming of a series of torture makes it into a singular event which has negative events, but I can't imagine how else society could cohesively discuss the series without a name.

Five Theses on Torture

Avelar's Second Thesis delves back into the analysis of the relationship between Torture and Voice. It brings us back to the works of Elaine Scarry and her thoughts about torture and language, self, and world. For this analysis we're focusing mainly on the relationship between torture and language. It goes into explain that inevitably the torturer is only a voice and the tortured is only a body.

More in depth, to me this means that the torturer has the power and the muscle to enforce this power yet they do not need this muscle. Passed a certain point, their voice becomes the only instrument they need to show their dominance over the tortured and to in turn once again torture them. Their voice becomes a constant reminder of what they have already gone through. This can be seen in Death and The Maiden. His voice in inevitably how she recognizes her torturer years later. The tortured on the other hand, no longer have their voice. They are just a body that is having to endure and feel the pain that the torturer is choosing to trust upon them. They have no voice to express their protests of the pain infliction. They don’t even have a voice to express how much it hurts because there is no one there to even listen. They are just an alienated body. 

Response to Five Theses on Torture

In "Five Theses on Torture", Idelbar Abelar, among other arguments, makes a case for the connection between torture and truth by synthesizing several notable works on the matter. One very interesting point that Abelar illuminates in Dubois’ work ‘Torture and Truth’, is an elaboration on the concept of alêtheia. Since this refers to truth that must be draw from elsewhere, a person must first be reduced to something inferior, through the means of basanos, before a secret truth can be revealed. And women and slaves, as argued here, are merely containers of alêtheia, which they themselves have no access to. I found it a little disturbing how in Lycurgus, Leocrates’ slaves were used as bartering tools to blackmail Leocrates into revealing the truth. Leocrates’ refusal to grant permission for his slaves to be tortured, something that would have inevitably resulted in the spilling of the truth, effectively criminalized him. In Greek democracy, it was up to the jurisdiction of the slave’s master over whether or not he could be tortured, and the only circumstances in which a slave’s opinion was legally relied upon was under torture, relying solely on truth obtained via basanos. Also, the connection between the slave and master is not absolute, as a free man can be reduced to a slave, or the equivalent, through torture.            

Five Theses On Torture - Idelber Avelar

Avelar borrows one of the main points from Foucault's argument in "Discipline and Punish". Avelar claims that the "modern apparatus [of torture] maintains the equation between truth and punishment but now withdraws if from the public sphere, in fact making the latter into the site of a possible struggle against torture, given that the confined space has been technologized and rationalized to the point where the torturer is granted a power that cannot be threatened." The claim that the transformation of torture from the public to the private sphere has given the torturer an undeniable power is intriguing to me. It makes sense, since the main motivation of the transition into the private sphere was the threat of the audience gaining more power than the torturer because of sheer mass. In the readings we've done, it has yet to be proven that torture can be overthrown in the private sphere. In The Wall, Death and the Maiden, The Crucible, and The Trial, the torturer is never overthrown. While their power might be challenged, it is never overthrown, and I wonder under what circumstances the torturer could lose power. The technology and rationalization that Avelar refers to is the "discipline" that Foucault mentions, which exercises power through routine and aims to modify and conform subjects. However, "discipline" according to Foucault does not always involve an "obscene exhibition" of torture's power, which Avelar claims is necessary.

Response to Five Theses on Torture

One point in Five Theses on Torture which really struck me as significant was when Idelber Avelar mentions the legacies of dictatorships.  Normally, when we think about the "legacy" of something or someone, it tends to be in a positive and nearly heroic light; however, it is definitely brought to a negative connotation when associated with dictatorship.  Specifically, the legacies of dictatorships mainly deals with the lexical and linguistic effects a dictatorship has upon the society.  Avelar's point is very similar to what we discovered in A Lexicon of Terror in the sense that language carries heavy ramifications which make progressing from a dictatorship especially difficult, such as the transition after Nazi Germany with Hitler in power or in Argentina with the various military-backed dictators who unlawfully corrupted the government and society.  As words become associated with terror, confession, or torture, these words become "haunted" in a sense, and keeping these words in a society's vocabulary only detracts from its ability to eventually progress.  Even minor subtleties in language can carry certain connotations with them which makes usage of specific words or phrases have a negative or pessimistic association with it.  Language holds a great impact upon society, and any damage caused to lexicon will hurt society as well.

Five These on Torture

         Although Avelar uses the cinematic version of Death and the Maiden as an example in his thesis about "On Torture and Sexual Differences", I found many ideas from his other theses that could be related to the movie as well. The idea of the voice in torture struck me as extremely interesting and relatable to the movie. In Death and The Maiden, Paulina recognizes her torturer through his voice, which is a horrifying realization. This is not the only evidence she uses to assure herself and her husband that Roberto was her torturer but it is extremely significant. In the movie we see that Paulina is able to recite dialogues that Doctor Miranda had said to her, and as an audience we can see how ingrained those painful memories are in her.

Another theme Avelar focused on was trauma and the effect it has on those who have been tortured. I really doubt anyone could ever be tortured and not face the psychological damage that occurs because of it. In O Judeau the audience sees the protagonist in agony as he reflects on the first time he has been tortured, and Paulina shares this same type of damage.

The selection “Nevertheless, he is oddly capable of being the head of a commission on human rights set up by the post-dictatorship government, and yet at the same time does not know what any Latin American would know about torture: the torture of women invariably includes rape and sexual violence. In other words, in trying to be feminist, the Polanski/Dorfman film constructs a couple composed of an hysteric and an idiot” was my favorite statement from this essay as it is funny but painfully accurate. I also figured that reading this selection that mentions all of the other important works we have discussed was no coincidence, and therefore many themes and motifs we have analyzed as a class reflected the issues written about in this passage.

Five Theses on Torture Response

A very interesting distinction that I found in Five Theses on torture is the distinction between the truth of torture and the authority of speaking that testimony on torture needs to have. The truth of torture occurring in South American countries is not something that is contested, it is accepted as truth, however someone testifying that they were tortured or commenting the acts of torture are required to provide a proof authority for their discussion on torture. So I found it very interesting that although the general idea of torture being used is accepted as a general truth, someone wanting to discuss their torture has to prove something first. The statement of general torture has truth associated with it, but the specifics of it automatically inspire doubt.

                The second point that I found interesting was the idea that how acts of torture are named changes how it is viewed. The name Apartheid and the Holocaust imply singular, completed events that are in the past, instead of being descriptors of specific types of events. To use Holocaust is a “allegory” for an event, relating an event back to what Germans did to the Jewish people, but to use it as holocaust is a “metaphor” that instead suggests that such events are not in the past but that similar events could be continuing to happen elsewhere. Such distinction, although small, I find to be incredibly interesting in how such a small difference as the capitulation of a latter can change how a word is thought about in common use.

Response to Death and the Maiden

Death and the Maiden by Ariel Dorfman is about a woman named Paulina, who was taken and raped by an unnamed doctor, finds herself in his midst years later. Only, her paranoia takes over the situation, and it is never clear whether or not, Dr. Miranda is truly at fault for the rape. Although, I'm curious to know if her paranoia and perverse thoughts is the result of the trauma she faced through rape and capture during political tyranny. It brings back the idea of experiencing so much pain that the idea of the world through your eyes is changed after so much physical or psychological torture. We saw this in "The Wall" by Sartre, when Pablo's psychological torture changed his idea about life and death and the emptiness of it all. In Death and the Maiden, we, as well as Paulina's husband, find it as a reader hard to believe Paulina's story because of the psychological trauma that she faced through the rape. The idea became warped when physical torture was introduced into Paulina's storyline. Had she not, we may have been more inclined to believe her.

The Fall

In The Fall by Albert Camus the main character Jean-Baptiste takes on an interesting role as he is talking with the reader. Jean-Baptiste shows that he has a desperate need to be above everyone else. this need is both figuratively with status and noble deeds as well as literally with trying to physically be above others. Jean-Baptiste is extremely selfish and can not really do something for anyone else. In the story he walks a blind man across the street, but he does not do this for the man. Jean-Baptiste is doing this to make himself feel better and because other people are watching and he wants them to think highly of him. When the attention and onlookers are not there Jean-Baptiste encounters a chance to be helpful on a much larger scale. A woman jumped off a bridge and he can hear her drowning. Instead of trying to save her he leaves her because he could have potentially drowned. This brought up the question of wether or not it is possible to do something completely for someone else. This brought up the question to myself of if it is possible to do something solely for someone else. I still do not know for sure, but as of now I can not think of a situation where someone can do something for someone else and not have any benefit. This is because when we do good deeds or do things for other people we feel good about it.

Ariel Dorfman, "Death and the Maiden"

The setting of the play is set in a dictatorship, where Paulina Salas is a oppressed woman who has been blindfolded and tortured by her captors. She particularly remembers a doctor that plays Schubert's "Death and the Maiden" as he rapes her. Several years later, the military regime soon shifts to a democracy, and Paulina is now a married woman living with her lawyer husband, Gerardo, in a countryside home. After work, Gerardo brings home a man named Dr. Roberto Miranda, who Paulina recognizes as her rapist through his voice. She takes him captive and tries to extract a confession out of him. Gerardo tries to defend Roberto by formulating a confession in order to calm Paulina down. In the end, we are left hanging as to whether Roberto is the actual rapist and whether Paulina is correct or insane. 

The theme of torture and power is prevalent throughout the play. We see that even after so many years, the torture and rape she experienced still keeps her paranoid: the rapist doctor still holds power over her through the memories. The placid Schubert piece that was supposed to help her be calm was instead used as an agent of pain that only helps her remember the horrid memories of her rape. Her blindfold was what the doctor used to hold power over her as an agent of pain; he can see her, but she can't see him. 

The blindfold is also what causes the ambiguity of the plot: because of the blindfold, Paulina couldn't see who her rapist was, and therefore we cannot count her as a reliable witness to her torture. She did recognize the voice of her rapist. However, we cannot be sure whether or not her sense of world and self has been destroyed by the torture and she has become psychotic. What is intriguing is that even the genre of this work, a play, lends to the theme of ambiguity. We cannot get into the minds of the characters because of the impersonal aspect of the play, and therefore we do not know which character to side with. In the end, the ambiguity of the play can also torture the reader, and the withheld information can hold power of us as well.

Death and the Maiden response

“Death and the Maiden” is a play about a young woman named Paulina who is raped and tortured by a doctor. The woman never finds out who the man is, but years later, she believes it is her husband’s guest (Roberto) by the sound of his voice. She traps Roberto in a room to interrogate him and he is never freed until he confesses that he did indeed rape her. While this seems like pure justice, the truth behind the Roberto’s confession is questionable to say the least. The husband, acting as Roberto’s lawyer, seemingly helps him craft a false confession in order for him to go home and to help his wife reach some closure, but Paulina believes the confession is true because it supposedly includes details that she has never relayed to her husband. The ambiguity behind the truth of Roberto’s confession is what is most disturbing yet entertaining about the play. While I was reading this, I felt like there was enough closure to the play just because he confessed and was freed, not because his confession was actually real or not. I didn’t quite care whether or not he did it since it wouldn’t change Paulina’s history, but it would most likely soothe her need to know who her torturer was and thus a need for a confession (not even an apology.) Even after the confession, she does not attempt to press charges or punish him. This made me wonder about why we desire confessions: it doesn’t really right a wrong, but it still gives us a sense of justice simply from being in control over the supposed criminal. 

Death and the Maiden

The play  Death and the Maiden really brings light in to the already previously discussed topics in class. It once again question the relationship between confession and truth. Paulina, during her entire adult life, has been haunted by an act that happened so long ago, by someone she never even saw. But once her husband brings home a mysterious stranger who just seems to want to help, his voice immediately  makers her jump into action. Could this really be her rapist?

The confession is extremely drawn out and has many layers to it. The question is whether or not it is true? The confession was originally meant to be put together by her husband who simply wants her to find relief and even release from her past but it contains details that only the rapist could know. This phenomenon really leaves the reader questioning whether or not the confession is true. There truly is no way to know, every reader may have a different opinion. In my opinion, I do believe he is the rapist simply because the voice of someone who leaves you with such psychological damage is not a voice you forget. 

A Lexicon of Terror

Marguerite Feilowitz's A Lexicon of Terror: Argentina and the Legacies of Torture deals with the Dirty War in Argentina.   Argentina's Dirty War involved mass amounts of kidnappings, robberies and muggings, torture, terrorism, violence, and murders because of the corruption which existed in the government system, which was a dictatorship at the time.  Every few years, the existing government would be overthrown in a coup d'état by a new high ranking official backed by the Argentinian army.  The Dirty War instituted significant corruption in the way businesses worked, politics worked, and how society was run.  Children of desaparecidos, individuals who spoke out against or opposed the government and thus were kidnapped and sent to prisons or concentration camps, were forced to live in new homes with families that have close ties to the existing government and/or military.  A big part of society, language, began to change drastically as well.  Certain words, because of the widespread violence and fear of torture, carried harsh connotations.  Even today, these words are holding back much of Argentina from recovering from the dark era which was the Dirty War.  It shows the immense impact language can have upon a society.  Thus, the language has transformed into a language of terror, a longstanding negative effect torture can have.

Death and The Maiden

I really enjoyed Death and The Maiden and found it to be an extremely thought-provoking read. We are introduced to our three characters, Paulina, her husband Gerardo, and Roberto. We discover that Paulina was tortured and raped under the dictatorship the unknown-to-the-reader country was in and she believes Roberto is the man who had raped her. Along with some of my fellow classmates, I believe confession plays a very important role in this piece. As a reader, you feel pathos for Paulina since she experienced torture and rape, very traumatic events. On the other hand, we have the man who is responsible for inflicting both physical and psychological pain and we see how his action has affected him as well. "There can be no worse punishment than that which is imposed upon me by the voice of my conscience" is an extremely powerful phrase taken from the play. It is a super relatable quote in which the reader can identify with and therefore makes his offense seem a little less harsh because we want to believe that he has suffered from the pain he has inflicted on Paulina. Yet at the same time the reader can see how he dramatizes his confession similar to how Rosseau does in his work Confessions.

Response to Death and the Maiden

            Death and the Maiden follows the story of Paulina, who is raped by an unidentified man.  When her husband brings in a guest who Paulina believes is her rapist, she traps the man and interrogates him until he gives a confession, which may or may not be the truth.  This ties in perfectly to what we have been discussing in class – that a confession is needed for torture (or a trial/interrogation) to end, and that it is often not clear whether the victim of torture is merely saying what the interrogators want to hear in order to end their ordeal.  In this case, Paulina believes Roberto is telling the truth, but it is not entirely made clear that he is.  The truth of his confession is left vague, like many confessions generally are.

            This story also illustrates Scarry’s theory of a tortuous experience being self-destroying.  Paulina is clearly traumatized from being raped, and she suffers extreme psychological damage from the event.  This is symbolized by the song Death and the Maiden, which is playing during her rape.  She is scarred by the event and this is shown by her fear of the song and how it never leaves her.  The damage that is done to her that she never recovers from is the result of her world and self being destroyed through the tortuous experience of her rape.

Death and the Maiden

Death and the Maiden  by Ariel Dorfman is definitely different than anything else we have read, which I found very interesting. Paulina Salas was raped, but never saw the man’s face. Although she did not the face of the man who caused her this great pain and torture, she heard his voice along with Schubert’s composition Death and the Maiden. This left the sound of his voice being the only thing she could identify him with. Years after this torture occurred, Paulina’s husband, Gerardo Escobar, is given a ride home from a man who stopped to help him, Dr. Miranda. Paulina recognizes Dr. Miranda’s voice as that of her rapist. This brings back all the painful memories, so she decides to hold him captive and interrogate him with the hopes for a confession. Gerardo acts as Dr. Miranda’s lawyer, but helps find a confession with the intentions to set his wife free of her painful past. She finally get’s a confession out of Dr. Miranda and he is set free. What I found very interesting about this play is how it switches from the person getting tortured turning into the interrogator and the person causing the world and self losing pain turning into the person being interrogated. The play made it unclear who is actually being truthful or lying and if the confession is real or if it had been a constructed confession with the help of her husband.