Death And The Maiden In Chile By Gabriel Dorfman

How was your understanding of cultural and contextual considerations of the work developed through the interactive oral?
Ariel Dorfman wrote Death and the Maiden in Chile, 1990, when Patricio Aylwin had just won the election, and Pinochet had stepped down as head of state, but the main plot had already formed in his mind by 1982, in the heat of the Pinochet dictatorship. Dorfman strongly opposed the Pinochet dictatorship, and, once it had come to an end, he believed that all the crimes committed under it should be brought to light and revealed to the public, and this is what he attempted to do in writing this play.
During the interactive oral, one of the main articles of discussion was the mixed reception of the play, due to the divided public

Dorfman emphasises this by including ‘Sounds of the sea’ as the first stage direction, repeating variations of this line at the beginning of almost every scene. Ostensibly the role of sound appears confined to the creation of suspense in terms of the references: ‘beyond’ and ‘approaching’, in the stage directions: ‘Sounds of the sea beyond. Sounds of a car approaching’. However, the parallel between the audience first experiencing the play through the medium of sound, and Paulina’s music-filled, blinded rape engages the audience’s sympathy in that they appreciate the vulnerability that a reliance on hearing instils in one. This parallel is cemented by the allusion to darkness, in referring to ‘After midnight’ and Paulina hearing ‘wonderful music in the darkness’. The title perhaps adds richness to this parallel in that prior to watching Death and the Maiden, the audience associate the phrase with Schubert’s quartet. The act of watching the play melds the phrase inextricably with the memories of Paulina’s rape. This mirrors the fact that Schubert was Paulina’s ‘favourite composer’ before her rape, and yet afterwards she ‘prays they won’t put on Schubert’. Dorfman further emphasises this idea with the image of: ‘In the darkness, we hear Roberto’s voice overlapping with Paulina’s and the second movement of Death and the Maiden’. Dorfman’s allusion to music as a stimulant of emotions and memories is further emphasised by the use of aural leitmotifs, such as ‘the real real truth’ and ‘teensy weensy bit’. Paulina and Roberto’s repetition of these phrases throughout the play heightens and warps the audience’s awareness of them, synthesising that same paranoia that Paulina’s trauma induces. Dorfman’s attempt to create an intimacy between the audience and Paulina through the