La reconquête identitaire par le témoignage dans La muerte y la doncella d’Ariel Dorfman

Abstract

Dorfman’s La muerte y la doncella illustrates a Chilean socio-political problem, that of a country in the process of rebuilding after the dictatorship, but whose testimonies are missing or prevented. Dorfman highlights the need to remember through the portrayal of three characters who disagree about the need for testimony, whether to share it or not. He underlines the ghostly state of the victim, and hence of the country, by justifying his malaise by the impossibility of communicating and testifying about his traumas. He thus questions the indefectible link between memory and identity, between speaking out and self-existence.

Keywords

• theatre
• testimony
• impeded memory
• trauma
• Chile