Pegasus Players to Perform Death and the Maiden

Over 200 Students to Read Drama on Torture, Rape, & Execution in Chile’s Military Detention Centers —Amnesty International to Underscore Play’s Relevance Before Nov. 10th & 11th Production

Pegasus Players will perform Ariel Dorfman’s award winning drama Death and the Maiden on November 10th and 11th in Dole Auditorium. Auditions will take place at the end of September and rehearsal will begin in October.

For the first time in the nearly-ninety year existence of Pegasus, a number of faculty in a variety of academic disciplines have tailored their syllabi to include the play. As a result, over 200 students, taking classes in Philosophy, Criminal Justice, History, as well as English, will read and study Death and the Maiden.

In conjunction with the performance, Joshua Rubenstein, the northeast regional director of Amnesty International, will speak on “Human Rights and the War on Terror” on October 18th. Also, on the first night of the performance, Rowland Brucken, associate professor of history, will lead a post-play discussion.

First performed at the Royal Court Theatre in London in 1991, the play revolves around the character Paulina Escobar whose husband, Girardo, unwittingly introduces her to a man she accuses of torturing and raping her while she was a prisoner in a Chilean detention center under the dictatorship of General Augusto Pinochet.

Helen Caudill, professor of theatre and Pegasus director, said she picked Death and the Maiden as the fall production because it raises a number of “timely, provocative questions.”  According to Caudill, foremost among the issues the play considers is whether the oppressed are capable of or should be capable of mercy and empathy in the world today? Caudill admitted that she, herself, is uncertain how she would answer such a question. She hopes her uncertainty will be resolved as she and the Pegasus cast and crew rehearse the show in the coming weeks.

Like Caudill, a number of faculty in a variety of disciplines believe even though the context of Death and the Maiden is the military coup that occurred in Chile in 1973, the play is powerful because it is relevant to a range of circumstances and events that have been witnessed and debated today.

According to Judith Stallings-Ward, assistant professor of Spanish, the value of Death and the Maiden lies in the way Dorfman “layered” meaning into traumatic experience. “The play,” she said, “shows not only the manner in which gender power struggle and political power struggle may be inextricably bound, but also the ambivalent, volatile manner in which power circulates on a national level and on an interpersonal level.”

Stallings-Ward uses Death and the Maiden in her survey courses of Hispanoamerican literature, but believes the play should be required reading for all students taking courses in literature and history.

Both Rowland Brucken, associate professor of history, and Robert McKay, professor of philosophy, are interested in the way the play relates to “restorative justice” which examines how victims of human rights abuse can be compensated. McKay explained that the “truth commission,” a pivotal part of Death and the Maiden, is a central component of restorative justice.  Brucken added that the play “speaks powerfully to issues of impunity, the costs of burying the past, and the terrible impact of silence on victims of human rights abuses.”

Brucken will refer to Death and the Maiden in his Nation Building course when the class discusses how states which transition to democracy respond to human rights atrocities. McKay, as well, said the play speaks to a number of issues that arise in Criminal Justice Ethics. He said Death and the Maiden will serve as one of the springboards to debate “methods of police interrogation and domestic prison abuse as well as a phenomenon referred to as ‘noble-cause corruption,’ where police or prosecutors are led to misconduct (or worse) because they believe they are serving the public interest.” Furthermore, McKay said the latest edition of the textbook he uses in the course has a new chapter on “Crime Control, Human Rights and the War on Terror.” “Fairly or not,” McKay said, “the abuses of detainees at Abu Ghraib and elsewhere has put the United States in the dock of world opinion, and raises questions about how we distinguish ourselves from regimes like Pinochet.”

In addition to the historical and political context as well as the various questions that arise from its plot, Andrew Knauf, professor of English, said he’ll use Death and the Maiden in Composition and Literature because it will allow students to truly see the differences between literary genres that are examined in the class. “To use a play,” Knauf said, ”that Pegasus will actually perform provides a wonderful opportunity for students to experience how viewing events on stage is very different from witnessing them unfold on the page.” He said he was “delighted” to provide students with the chance to learn about drama first hand that never seems to be replicated by television or cinema.