Jill Szoo Wilson

Poem: Of Melody and of Moan

The sky is hot like leather

Brown and coating our skin

With beads surging into streams

Of sweat


In the distance

A lonely guitar throbs

Crooning refrains of love

And regret


We toil long and

Hum the oscillating songs

One by one to forget

The hour


Bugs sway back and forth

On blades of green

Tired and scorched by fever and

By life


Women tell stories

Laugh with heads thrown back

Simple versions of disaster pulsate in

Their smiles


Men with sinewy arms

Pull from the lazy earth

Swollen roots of sustenance and

Of dreams


Children thump the ground

Like ragtime drummers

Beating rhythms of play and

Far away


The musician strums andante

Caressing silvery strings releasing

Vibrations of melody and

Of moan.


© Jill Szoo Wilson, 2023

The Courage to Imagine: Acting, Attention, and the Recovery of Interior Life

By Jill Szoo Wilson

Prologue

What follows are some specific thoughts on the role of the imagination and how I’m witnessing a slow decline in students’ ability to stick with a moment of “play” or creative imagination long enough to reach the truth embedded in the script.

When I began as a private acting coach a couple of decades ago, nearly all my students were either homeschooled or from Christian backgrounds. This was largely due to the environment in which I began. I had just graduated from a Christian university with my MFA in Acting and Directing for Theatre. During my time there, I helped design and launch a summer theatre camp, which drew a large following from the homeschool community. Many of those kids continued lessons with me long after camp was over.

Today, most of my students are no longer homeschooled, but many are still Christian. This is probably because many of my students already share a Christian worldview, and my teaching naturally aligns with it. I teach them how to act with technical skill, emotional honesty, and respect for the craft, as well as how to be artists and professionals in what is often a dark industry. We talk openly about integrity, boundaries, and how to navigate the pressures and temptations that come with performance culture. My goal is not just to prepare them for auditions or roles, but to help them become thoughtful, resilient artists who can carry the light of Christ into places where it’s often absent. I don’t market specifically to Christian students, but we have plenty of reasons to find each other and to enjoy working together.

That said, I do find that young Christian students tend to struggle with guilt and shame to a particularly high degree during the rehearsal process. We talk about it often. While I always choose material that is age-appropriate and content-appropriate for every student (and for myself, as I don’t enjoy lascivious or graphic pieces either), those who grew up in the church—Catholic, Lutheran, Evangelical, etc.—often feel very self-conscious as actors when they begin.

Girls are taught to be kind, service-oriented, loving, and demure. Boys are taught to be tough, heroic, good, and sensitive to the needs of others. These are all admirable traits. To be a man or woman of virtue, exhibiting the Fruit of the Spirit, should lie at the heart of our longing to be more like Christ. I could easily veer into an essay about how to marry our faith with our work, but for the sake of this particular piece, I’ll return to the central idea:

Christian students often struggle to play characters who don’t look like themselves or like those they aspire to become. Fair enough. But here’s the truth: life is full of good and evil. Villains and heroes. Builders and those who destroy. Most of us, over the course of a lifetime, are both. We’re all villains to some and heroes to others. We know what it is to build, and we know what it is to wound. To pretend otherwise is to whitewash life and ourselves, which usually leads to hiding in one way or another. So, it’s important for me to talk about redemptive stories with my students so they can confront this dichotomy rather than fearing it.

There are two kinds of redemptive stories: those that show us the good things that happen when we choose well, and those that show us the damage that occurs when we don’t.

That’s a simplified way to put it, but given that my students range in age from eight to fifty-five, the universality of this statement is often helpful to everyone for different reasons.

So, what do we do with the villains in the plays we read? What do we do when we agree to play Lady Macbeth in Macbeth, Regan in King Lear, or Medea in the title role? And what about Iago in Othello, Richard III, or Judge Turpin in Sweeney Todd? Do we flatten the character to fit inside our comfort zone? Do we avoid even considering the thought process of a conniver? Do we soften Medea’s rage to make the role more “Christian”?

I certainly hope not! If we do, we’re not being truthful. We’re pretending we never act with malice, selfishness, or harm. And if we refuse to embody those moments in a role—if we never stop to consider the villain’s position—we are denying ourselves an opportunity to understand something essential: that evil is not always monstrous or distant. Sometimes it begins with resentment. Or jealousy. Or the belief that we deserve more than we’ve received. Sometimes it begins with a wound. To engage that truth in rehearsal is not to condone it, but to confront it honestly. That kind of imaginative empathy sharpens discernment. It invites self-examination. It strengthens our ability to recognize corruption when it appears in ourselves or others. To avoid this work is not only to limit our range as actors, but to remain shallow as people.

Most of us will never seize power and destroy our father like Regan. Most of us will never seduce a woman named Lady Anne over her father-in-law’s corpse like Richard III. But if we take the time to understand the goodness of God and the brokenness of the world, we can, as Aristotle suggested, experience catharsis and reason together: I will not seduce. I will not murder. I’ve seen what happens when people do.

What follows are thoughts on the role of imagination in the life of an actor. To live truthfully in imaginary circumstances, we must first be willing to imagine.

The Studio and the Threshold of Imagination

This morning, I sat across from a college-aged student in a small studio, the kind with a well-worn rehearsal floor and no mirrors to distract. She was working through a dramatic monologue from King John, trying to locate the inner grief of Constance as she mourns the disappearance of her son, Arthur. The lines are some of Shakespeare’s most anguished:

“I am not mad; I would to heaven I were, For then ’tis like I should forget myself. O, if I could, what grief should I forget!”

My student is brilliant. She’s bright-eyed, classically educated, and emotionally intuitive. She understands the language and the circumstances. She grasps the weight of the moment intellectually. And yet, she struggles to connect with it fully. Her technique is solid. She found the beats and shifted breath and focus in the right places. The anguish, however, stayed on the surface and heightened. Her performance was more inferred than embodied, and she remained ungrounded.

So I gave her a note I’ve given many actors before her: “Particularize your son.” She nodded. She knew what I meant.

In actor training, particularly within the Meisner tradition, particularization is a foundational method for grounding performance in emotional truth, and it’s often misunderstood. Particularization in Meisner’s framework is not the same as the imaginative substitution associated with Stanislavski’s “Magic If.” The “Magic If” asks the actor to imagine themselves in the character’s situation—”What would I do if my son were taken from me?”—and then to act from that imagined scenario. This technique can be useful, as it encourages imaginative entry into a character’s world. But it relies on hypothetical identification; on asking ‘what if’ rather than anchoring the moment in lived emotional truth.

Meisner’s approach is different. It does not rely on imagining how one might feel in a fictional situation. It asks the actor to bring something real into the room. Something personal, visceral, and emotionally immediate. When I asked my student to particularize her son, I was not asking her to pretend to be a grieving mother. I was asking her to locate, in her own life, a person whose loss would pierce her. It could be a nephew, a younger brother, a godchild; anyone she has known and loved. Particularization is not fantasy. It is emotional preparation. The actor identifies a core emotional truth and allows that truth to live inside the moment.

This act is deliberate and vulnerable. It involves risk, attention, and a willingness to be seen. Because the actor is not pretending to feel, they are allowing themselves to feel. They are not trying to generate an emotion; they are giving themselves permission to respond to something that already holds weight in their inner world. Meisner insisted that acting lives in behavior, not in ideas. The words of a script are not the truth. The behavior underneath the words is where the truth resides.

When an actor says, “My son is gone,” the goal is not to deliver the line convincingly. The goal is to experience the truth of the line in real time. To say it while bearing the weight of one’s own emotional stakes. Particularization enables this. It shifts the actor from performing to being.

Still, something was missing. Despite her strong technique, something in her body remained disengaged. The truth hovered at the edges of the performance but never fully arrived. She wore the grief like a garment, but it had not yet reached her center.

This is a moment I have seen many times before. The student understands everything intellectually. The beats are there. The breath work is honest. And still, something inside hesitates. The mind approaches something emotionally risky, and the body pulls back. It happens quickly, often invisibly. A short-circuit. A retreat from vulnerability.

They stop mid-imagining. Mid-feeling. Mid-play.

This phenomenon is increasingly common. The cause appears to be cultural. We are watching a generation experience limited access to its imaginative life, not from apathy or lack of talent, but from being conditioned to remain just outside the threshold of deep interiority.

What fractures their concentration? What prevents them from crossing into full imaginative immersion?

Several things come to mind.

Sanford Meisner defined good acting as “living truthfully under imaginary circumstances.” Acting depends on entering. The actor allows themselves to be changed by what they imagine. In those moments, fiction becomes felt reality.

Meisner’s exercises do not focus on displaying emotion. They create conditions in which emotion arises organically. The goal is to engage the body before the mind intervenes with commentary or self-protection. Acting, in this view, requires attention; deep, sustained, emotional attention.

This is where the struggle appears.

Many students today experience difficulty maintaining emotional attention beyond a few seconds. Their minds are quick. Their instincts are strong. Yet under the weight of prolonged inner focus, their attention fractures. This does not stem from apathy, but from exhaustion. Their habits have been shaped by technologies and cultural rhythms that favor speed, fragmentation, and external validation over interior stillness.

A 2022 study published in Nature Communications found that global attention spans as measured by patterns of media engagement, have diminished over the past two decades. Our minds now pursue novelty more than depth. This shift influences more than productivity. It reshapes presence itself. It reconfigures the architecture of imagination.

Where actors once learned to build an imagined world and dwell in it, students today often find themselves pulled back by an invisible thread. They experience the impulse to check, to hesitate, to self-correct. Even in silence, they sense an audience. When external attention dominates, internal vision struggles to take root.

What I observe in the studio speaks to more than acting. It reflects a broader cultural wound. A drifting away from solitude. A quiet that grows more elusive. A loss of what the educator Charlotte Mason called “the habit of the reflective life.” In Mason’s view, imagination is a moral capacity. To imagine well is to love well. The capacity to enter another’s experience nurtures empathy, endurance, and attention. Like any virtue, it strengthens through practice.

How does one train imagination in a world of interruption?

This erosion of imaginative endurance presents a pressing concern. It reaches beyond the artist. It speaks to anyone seeking a meaningful existence amid constant noise. The deep spaces where empathy takes form, convictions clarify, and quiet truths surface depend on interior cultivation. A society that nurtures imagination forms individuals who respond with discernment and depth.

Classical educators have long understood the affinity between imagination and truth. Plato, though cautious of the poets, affirmed that metaphor helps the soul ascend toward the Good. Aristotle praised catharsis as a soul-cleansing process through imitation. Centuries later, C. S. Lewis called imagination the “organ of meaning.” Through it, knowledge gains emotional resonance. Facts become deeply known.

Contemporary students navigate a world full of information and comparisons. Previous generations may have asked, “Will I do something meaningful?” Today’s students often wonder, “Can I create something distinct enough to matter?”

This is the cost of saturation. So many voices, so many images, so many claims on the imagination cause silence to feel irrelevant. Stillness begins to feel misaligned with progress. In such an environment, the long breath required for full imaginative entry feels like a rarity.

And yet that long breath must return. We can help restore it.

Imagination brings shape to stories. It deepens relationships. It sustains a sense of mystery, sacredness, beauty, and possibility. Rather than vanishing, imagination waits. It remains present beneath the surface noise. It endures through fractured attention and abandoned moments of thought. It waits for breath. For solitude. For the courage to enter again.

In my work with students, I encourage them to slow down, not as a strategy, but as a way of being. They are learning to stay present inside a moment, linger with an image, and let silence stretch. Not everything needs to resolve quickly. Some truths arrive only through stillness, and meaning often deepens through sustained practice rather than polished execution.

Imagination does not pull us away from the world. It grounds us more deeply in it. It sharpens perception. It draws our focus toward what lasts. This is why Shakespeare continues to speak, and why Meisner’s invitation to live truthfully in imagined circumstances still carries weight. These are not artistic artifacts. They are instruments of renewal.

✨ If you’d like to keep reading more essays like this, you can also find me on Substack: https://substack.com/@jillszoowilson

The Cost of Becoming: Willy Loman and the Collapse of the Performed Self

By Jill Szoo Wilson

Prologue: Playing Willy Loman

Before one analyzes Willy Loman, one must attempt to inhabit him. The work of the actor offers more than interpretation; it offers a way into his psychology. The Meisner technique, which trains actors to live truthfully under imaginary circumstances, demands that a character be approached not as a symbol or a mood, but as a person with specific objectives. The actor does not play a man who is sad, but a man trying to appear happy. One does not play drunkenness, but the effort to walk in a straight line. One does not play collapse, but the relentless pursuit of control.

This approach becomes essential in performing Willy. He cannot be played as someone unraveling. He must be played as someone still trying to climb. He is not aware of his disintegration. He is fighting it. The tension in his voice, the urgency in his gait, and the rhythm of his speech can all reveal a man still chasing validation, still working to prove himself, still trying to matter.

Just as a villain does not see himself as a villain, the actor playing Willy must believe in the truth of the character’s motivations. Willy believes in the story he tells. The sales pitch is not a metaphor to him; it’s survival. Every gesture carries the imprint of past successes. Every pause contains the weight of unseen failure. His tragedy is not that he has given up, but that he cannot. His pursuit has become his identity.

The actor must approach each moment with this in mind. Willy is not asking for pity. He is asking to be heard, to be remembered, to be great. Even in his most fractured scenes, he is still performing the role of the man he once hoped to be. That performance is what ultimately breaks him.

Brian Dennehy played Willy Loman on Broadway in the early 2000s. I had the pleasure of seeing this production in person.

Introduction

In the years following World War II, American culture embraced the idea that prosperity would generate both comfort and cohesion: a sense of stability, belonging, and self-worth rooted in home ownership, upward mobility, and steady employment. The war had ended in victory, the suburbs were blooming, and economic expansion offered a vision of order that felt both new and enduring. This was a time of rising optimism, when the pursuit of the American Dream—embodied in hard work, domestic life, and professional success—was framed as a moral ideal. To believe in that dream was to place oneself inside a shared national story. A meaningful life, it seemed, could be earned through effort and aspiration.

Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman confronts the unraveling of that story. At its center stands Willy Loman, a traveling salesman whose crisis begins in the workplace and spills into the core of his identity. His crisis is not only economic but existential. As the play unfolds, we encounter a man whose inner life begins to dissolve: his memories crowd the present, his sense of time becomes unstable, and his relationships erode. Miller’s dramatic world offers more than a critique of economic pressure; it becomes a crucible in which identity itself bends and breaks.

This essay explores how Death of a Salesman dramatizes the collapse of identity when it is built on an external ideal. Through its fragmented structure, expressionist form, and intergenerational tension, the play traces the unraveling of Willy Loman, a man whose self-worth depends on a version of success shaped by visibility, wealth, and admiration. Though rooted in social realism, the play frequently breaks from naturalistic conventions, blending realism with expressionism to capture the fragmentation of Willy’s mind. Cultural messages about achievement, the burden of familial expectation, and the seductive pull of nostalgia all conspire to distort his self-concept. At its heart, Miller’s work raises a haunting question: What remains of the self when it is built on a dream that was never truly one’s own?

Section I: Early Formations of Selfhood

Willy Loman emerges as a man profoundly shaped by the cultural messages of postwar America. From the outset, his understanding of worth is externalized. He believes that being well-liked is the key to success, repeating the idea that popularity and personal charisma matter more than skill. This philosophy informs the way he raises his sons and evaluates his own life. Developmental psychologist Erik Erikson writes that “identity is formed through the interplay of biological givens and societal roles” (Identity: Youth and Crisis, 1968). For Willy, that interplay is dangerously out of sync. He confuses approval with value and presentation with substance.

His identity becomes performative, reliant on others’ perceptions. In his frequent recollections of his brother Ben, Willy shows how deeply he clings to mythic narratives. Ben represents everything Willy wishes he had become: wealthy, decisive, and respected. “When I walked into the jungle, I was seventeen. When I walked out, I was twenty-one. And, by God, I was rich!” (Miller 48). For Willy, this anecdote is more than family lore; it is a talisman against failure. In Ben, he sees proof that success is a singular, dazzling act, not a long process, but a moment of transformation. And so, Willy waits for his moment like a lion stalking prey already devoured by another. The instinct remains, but the opportunity has vanished. His belief in the singular triumph blinds him to the slow work of becoming.

Psychologist Carl Rogers suggests that when individuals base their self-worth on “conditions of worth” imposed by others, they lose touch with their authentic selves (On Becoming a Person, 1961). Willy embodies this distortion. Rather than cultivating a stable internal identity, he attaches his sense of self to external validation. He cannot separate his inner value from his outer performance.

Section II: The Rise and Fracture of Familial Expectations

Willy places immense hope in Biff, his eldest son. He does not dream for Biff so much as he dreams through him. Biff becomes a vessel for Willy’s projected success. In adolescence, Biff appears to mirror his father’s charisma and confidence. He is popular, athletic, and adored. Willy sees this as evidence that Biff will fulfill the dream he himself could not. “He’s liked, but not—well liked,” Willy says of Bernard, dismissing the boy’s academic seriousness in favor of Biff’s charm (23). The phrase reveals more than Willy intends. In his world, being “well liked” carries spiritual weight. It’s not just a social advantage; it’s a measure of worth. To be well liked is to be blessed, chosen, and affirmed by the invisible hand of success. Bernard’s intelligence is treated as a liability because it lacks sparkle. Biff’s charm, by contrast, is seen as currency. The line crystallizes Willy’s lifelong confusion: he mistakes attention for esteem, applause for substance.

Yet Biff’s admiration is shattered during a business trip to Boston, when he discovers his father in a hotel room with another woman. The moment of betrayal is not just personal. It is psychological. Biff loses the man he admired, and with him, the sense of self that admiration supported. “You fake! You phony little fake!” he cries (95). In that rupture, the illusion collapses. Willy is not the great man Biff thought him to be, and Biff is no longer sure who he is without that image.

Attachment theorist John Bowlby notes that disruptions in trust between parent and child can result in identity disturbance, particularly if the child has built his self-understanding on idealized images (Attachment and Loss, 1969). Biff’s identity fractures because it was co-authored by a man whose own foundation was false. The fallout of this moment ripples across the rest of the play. Biff wanders, lost in purpose and direction, while Willy clings harder to the fading vision of success.

Yet Biff’s wandering is not aimless. Unlike his father, who remains trapped in denial, Biff begins to pursue a kind of difficult truth. His disillusionment, though painful, marks the beginning of a reckoning. In the final scenes, Biff confronts the family’s illusions with unflinching honesty, declaring that they have “never told the truth for ten minutes in this house” (103). This attempt at truth-telling, however raw, becomes a redemptive thread. While Willy doubles down on fantasy, Biff reaches for clarity even if it costs him the dream.

Section III: Memory, Time, and Psychological Regression

Miller does not portray Willy’s collapse as linear. Instead, he creates a psychological architecture in which memory intrudes on the present. Walls dissolve. Characters from the past arrive as though no time has passed. This expressionist structure captures the erosion of Willy’s psychological boundaries. He no longer revisits memories; he inhabits them. They become both a refuge and a trap.

Freud’s theory of repetition compulsion provides a compelling psychological lens for understanding Willy’s psychological breakdown. Introduced in Beyond the Pleasure Principle (1920), the theory describes a phenomenon in which individuals unconsciously repeat painful or traumatic experiences, not in pursuit of pleasure, but in an attempt to gain mastery over a past that remains unresolved. The repetition is not intentional; it emerges from the psyche’s attempt to regain control by recreating the conditions of the original wound. The individual returns to the same emotional terrain again and again, hoping—without realizing it—to alter the outcome.

In Willy’s case, the past does not visit him as memory but as lived experience. He does not recall; he reinhabits. Conversations with Ben, moments with Biff, echoes of earlier days surface with increasing urgency. These scenes carry the weight of regret, but they also offer him temporary refuge. Within them, he can reassert his authority, recover the image of success, and briefly inhabit the man he once believed himself to be. Unfortunately for Willy, his compulsion to return does not resolve the trauma. It deepens it. Each reenactment sharpens the ache. The life he wants to rewrite instead writes over him.

As the play progresses, these revisitations grow more urgent. He speaks to voices no one else can hear. He replays conversations aloud. The present loses its clarity. Psychologist Aaron Beck writes that depression often leads to cognitive distortions that warp time perception and induce emotional paralysis (Cognitive Therapy of Depression, 1979). Willy exhibits these distortions. He cannot live in the now. His present is filled with regret and inadequacy. His past gleams with untouchable promise.

Section IV: The Psychology of Shame and Withdrawal

Shame is the undercurrent of Willy’s emotional decline. Though he claims to be working for his family, he increasingly isolates himself from them. Linda, his wife, tries to reach him, but he bristles at her concern. When she encourages him to ask his boss for a non-traveling job, he responds with irritation, accusing her of planting ideas in his head, as if her care undermines his dignity. Happy, his younger son, is met with indifference. Willy rarely engages him beyond superficial conversation and often overlooks him entirely in favor of Biff. Even Biff, who offers a kind of brutal honesty, is met with deflection. When Biff attempts to confront the family’s long-standing illusions, declaring that they have never told the truth for more than ten minutes in the house, Willy interrupts and retreats, unwilling to accept what his son is beginning to understand.

These fractured interactions are not just defensive. They are symptomatic of shame. Willy withdraws not out of malice but out of an internalized belief that he has failed the people he loves. The more he feels exposed, the more he distances himself.

Psychologist Brené Brown defines shame as the belief that one is unworthy of love and belonging (Daring Greatly, 2012). Willy lives inside that belief. He feels he has failed as a provider, as a father, and as a man. Rather than face these feelings directly, he retreats. He speaks more to the past than to the people around him.

This retreat mirrors what psychiatrist Thomas Joiner identifies as “perceived burdensomeness” in his theory of suicidal desire (Why People Die by Suicide, 2005). Willy begins to believe that his death will serve his family better than his life. He rationalizes that his life insurance payout will redeem him in Biff’s eyes. “That boy is going to be magnificent!” he declares, convinced that death can function as a final gift (135).

Miller frames this moment with compassion, not justification. He does not glorify Willy’s decision. Instead, he lets the audience feel the ache of a man who could not see his own worth without applause.

Section V: Aftermath and Absence

The play closes not with resolution, but with absence. Willy dies believing that his sacrifice will redeem him in the eyes of his son and secure his family’s future. The imagined narrative is one of triumph: insurance money replacing lost income, Biff transformed by grief into the man Willy hoped he would become, the family finally recognizing the value of the man who died for them. It is, in Willy’s mind, the final performance—the last act of a salesman who believes his death will sell the very life he could not live.

What unfolds instead is a quiet, almost unbearable scene. Willy’s funeral is sparsely attended. No grand send-off, no chorus of admiration. Just a few family members and Charley, the neighbor whom Willy often disdained. The world does not gather to mourn the man who chased recognition his entire life. There is no validation, no final applause. The silence speaks louder than any eulogy.

At the center of this silence is Linda. Her grief does not erupt in fury or lamentation. It arrives as confusion. As a quiet disbelief. “I made the last payment on the house today,” she says, standing at his grave. “Today, dear. And there’ll be nobody home” (139). The line is devastating in its simplicity. The home they struggled to keep is now fully theirs, but the man who fought so hard to pay for it is gone. The achievement is hollow. The security came too late. The dream was achieved, but the dreamer did not survive it.

Linda’s mourning captures the full weight of the tragedy. She has stood by Willy through every descent, every contradiction, every delusion. She believed in his goodness, even when he could not believe in himself. Her sorrow is not only for the man she lost, but for the meaning he sought and never found. She cannot understand why he chose to go. Her words are not angry. They are bewildered. “Why did you do it?” she asks into the silence. “I can’t cry. It seems to me that you’re just on another trip” (139). Her grief is suspended between denial and realization, between the role she has always played and the irrevocable truth of what has happened.

Through Linda’s final words, Miller reveals the true cost of Willy’s collapse. The tragedy is not only the loss of his life, but the emotional wreckage left behind. The dream he chased—of being remembered, admired, and secure—comes to nothing. In its place is a widow talking to a headstone, a son trying to reclaim his own name, and a home that now stands empty.

The curtain falls not on resolution, but on the unanswerable questions that linger after loss.

Conclusion: The Dreamer and the Dream

Willy Loman’s tragedy is not rooted in villainy. It is rooted in a lifelong confusion about what makes a person valuable. He sought love through achievement, identity through performance, and belonging through admiration. These ideals were not his alone; they were etched into the fabric of postwar America, offered as promises of fulfillment. Yet for Willy, they remained just out of reach. The harder he chased them, the more his sense of self unraveled.

Arthur Miller does not simply critique capitalism or expose the instability of the American Dream. He offers something more intimate: a study of how a man can lose himself in a story he did not write, a story that told him who he had to be in order to matter. Willy’s longing is not ignoble. His devotion to family, to legacy, to being remembered are deeply human impulses. What makes the play so devastating is not that he failed, but that the very metrics by which he measured success were never meant to hold the weight of a soul. Had he altered those metrics—had he measured worth by presence rather than praise, by connection rather than conquest—his life might have been marked by meaning rather than collapse.

In the end, Death of a Salesman is not only about the disintegration of one man, but the disorientation left behind. Willy’s life is marked by performance, but his death forces those who loved him to ask not only what it was all for, but who he truly was beneath the roles he played. Why wasn’t the life they shared enough? Why wasn’t he enough, as he was? Why weren’t they enough, without the illusion? The play offers no final answer, only the echo of a question: What becomes of a person whose dream was never truly his own?

✨ If you’d like to keep reading more essays like this, you can also find me on Substack: https://substack.com/@jillszoowilson

Three Visions of the Stage: Plato, Socrates, and Aristotle on Theatre

By Jill Szoo Wilson

Introduction

From the festival stages of ancient Athens to the minimalist black boxes of the modern age, theatre has never merely been a mirror held up to nature. It has served as a site of moral tension, philosophical debate, and spiritual inquiry. For the Greeks, whose tragedies laid the foundation for Western drama and whose philosophers shaped the roots of Western thought, theatre was not neutral ground. It was divisive, provocative, and volatile. What is the purpose of theatre? Is it ethical instruction or emotional indulgence? Is it a path to wisdom or a distraction from truth?

This essay explores the philosophical tensions surrounding theatre in the writings of Plato, Socrates (as portrayed by Plato), and Aristotle. In their competing visions—suspicion, interrogation, and celebration—we encounter a triptych of enduring questions about the role of art in civic and moral life. Their disagreements are not confined to the past. They still echo in conversations about education, politics, and the power of performance.

These tensions are not relics of antiquity. They continue to animate our understanding of what theatre is and what it ought to be. When a play unsettles us, when a performance asks us to feel more deeply or consider a truth we have avoided, we are stepping into the same territory the Greeks once debated. The question is not only what theatre shows, but what it stirs and what it asks of us as thinking, feeling, moral beings.

Plato on Theatre: Emotion Without Reason

In The Republic, Plato’s distrust of theatre is unmistakable. For him, mimesis, or imitation, is not a creative virtue but a philosophical deficiency. According to his theory of Forms, the material world is already a shadow of a higher, eternal reality. Every physical object—a tree, a table, a human face—is merely an imperfect reflection of its ideal Form, which exists outside time and space. Knowledge, in this view, involves turning the soul away from sensory appearances and toward the realm of intelligible truth.

Art, and especially theatre, compounds the problem. A dramatic performance does not depict the Form of justice or courage; it portrays a person who appears to be just or courageous, often in highly distorted or emotionally exaggerated terms. Theatrical representation, then, becomes an imitation of an imitation: once removed from the eternal Forms by material reality, and once more by the artist’s interpretation of that reality. It is, in Plato’s words, “thrice removed from the truth.” As a result, art risks misleading the soul rather than educating it.

In Book X, Plato writes:

“We must remain firm in our conviction that no poetry should be admitted save hymns to the gods and encomia of good men” (Republic X.607a).

His condemnation is not primarily aesthetic but moral. The poet does not possess true knowledge of justice or the good, and therefore cannot be entrusted with shaping public consciousness. Tragedy, in particular, inflames the irrational parts of the soul. By encouraging audiences to identify with characters who suffer, fail, or behave disgracefully, drama bypasses the rational faculties that Plato considers essential to the formation of a virtuous life. It does not guide the audience toward reasoned understanding; it captivates and unsettles through spectacle. The result, he fears, is a citizenry more attuned to feeling than to thinking.

Plato’s anxiety is ultimately a question of power. Theatre, with its ability to move collective emotion, poses a threat to the philosopher’s authority as the rightful guide of the polis. In the ideal republic, governed by philosopher-kings, the stage has no place unless it can be strictly controlled. Plato imagines no version of poetry that does not require censorship, for the poetic voice competes with philosophy in shaping public values.

This suspicion of theatricality finds a distant but resonant echo in the work of Judith Butler, who argues in Excitable Speech that performative acts are not merely expressive but constitutive. This is to say, they do not simply reflect existing truths; they produce new realities through repetition and societal normalization. Although Butler’s focus is on gender, power, and language, her argument shares with Plato a central concern: speech and performance are not neutral. They are acts of world-making. Plato feared this generative capacity. For him, theatre does not merely mirror emotion; it incites it, destabilizes reason, and reshapes the soul without its consent. Both thinkers recognize that performance does not stay on the stage. It has the power to enter the world and alter it.

Socrates (via Plato): Interrogation Over Imitation

Socrates, who left no writings of his own, appears in Plato’s dialogues as a relentless questioner. As such, he is a figure more disruptor than dramatist, and a kind of anti-poet. In Ion, Gorgias, and The Apology, Socrates consistently distances himself from theatricality, often drawing sharp distinctions between genuine knowledge and rhetorical display. In Ion, for example, he confronts a rhapsode—a professional performer of epic poetry—who claims to interpret Homer:

“You speak of Homer, not as one having knowledge, but as one inspired… possessed” (Ion 533d).

Here, the artist is not a sage but a conduit. The rhapsode, though perhaps divinely touched, does not speak from knowledge but from inspiration. He performs poetry with passion, yet cannot explain its meaning. He moves others, but cannot account for his own words. For Socrates, this is a problem. Without understanding, performance becomes a kind of possession rather than a practice of reason.

Socratic philosophy demands more. It requires individuals to examine their beliefs, define their terms, and refine their views through conversation and debate. Knowledge, in this framework, is earned through dialogue. It is a process of discovery, not delivery. Truth must be questioned into existence.

By contrast, theatre tends to offer conclusions. It presents complete gestures, polished arcs, and emotional resolution. It engages the audience through emotion first, which, for Socrates, risks replacing reflection with identification. This kind of passivity may satisfy the appetite for entertainment, but it does little to cultivate wisdom. Art that stirs the soul without engaging the mind falls short of philosophy’s aim.

Yet the Socratic method itself is deeply performative. While Socrates critiques theatre for offering conclusions without examination, his own philosophical practice unfolds in forms that closely resemble dramatic encounter. Plato’s dialogues are structured not as essays but as scenes—carefully shaped exchanges between characters, full of tension, irony, and reversal. These are not lectures. They are dramatizations of inquiry. Characters enter with confidence and leave in confusion. Positions are tested, undermined, and reframed. The reader, like a spectator, witnesses the friction of minds in motion.

Even Socrates’ death, as recorded in The Apology and Phaedo, bears the marks of theatrical form. He drinks the hemlock not in solitude, but before a gathered public. His final words are neither anguished nor sentimental. They are measured, even instructive. The moment resists catharsis and refuses spectacle. If Greek tragedy aims for emotional release, Socrates’ death stages something else entirely: philosophical resolve. It becomes a kind of anti-tragedy, where the central figure does not unravel but remains fully composed, fully Socratic. In this light, Socrates does not reject performance altogether. He reclaims it for philosophy. His form of theatre is not emotional, but dialectical. It’s not a medium for answers, but for recursive questions, meaning questions that generate more questions rather than definitive answers. For example: What is justice? What is courage? What is the good life? In posing these questions again and again, Socrates transforms the act of dialogue into a space where inherited beliefs are challenged and thinking is tested.

This mode of engagement anticipates the work of later thinkers such as Bertolt Brecht, who sought to break the illusion of conventional theatre and replace it with critical distance. Brecht’s concept of the Verfremdungseffekt, or alienation effect, aims to interrupt emotional immersion and redirect the audience toward thought. His theatre invites discomfort and deliberately reminds the audience that what they are seeing is constructed, not natural, encouraging reflection rather than emotional immersion. In Socratic terms, Brechtian drama becomes a modern rehearsal of philosophical dialogue. It is deliberately unresolved, designed not to console, but to provoke.

Aristotle: Theatre Teaches Us How to Feel Wisely

If Plato regarded theatre with suspicion, Aristotle regarded it as a potential instrument of moral education. In Poetics, he does not dismiss tragedy; rather, he categorizes and defends it through careful analysis. For Aristotle, art does not distract from reality. It orders it. He defines tragedy as follows:

“An imitation of an action that is serious, complete, and of a certain magnitude… through pity and fear effecting the proper purgation of these emotions” (Poetics 1449b24–28).

The concept of catharsis, a cornerstone of Aristotle’s theory, anchors his defense of tragedy. Though notoriously difficult to translate, the term is often understood as a kind of purgation or purification of the emotions, specifically pity and fear. But catharsis is not simply the release of emotion. It is the transformation of emotional experience into a clearer understanding of human nature.

According to Aristotle, tragedy does not lead the audience into irrationality or emotional excess. It invites them to feel deeply in a structured and meaningful way. By observing characters who confront moral dilemmas, endure consequences, and wrestle with forces beyond their control, the audience participates in a kind of ethical rehearsal. The emotions that arise are not random or indulgent. They are guided and shaped by the dramatic structure.

In this process, pity and fear are not seen as weaknesses to be suppressed. They are part of what it means to be human. Tragedy does not eliminate these feelings. It refines them. The result is not a detachment from emotion, but a deeper engagement with it. Rather than leaving the theatre in confusion, the audience emerges with moral clarity. They are not simply moved. They are moved toward insight.

In this respect, Aristotle’s position bears resemblance to that of Martha Nussbaum, who argues in The Fragility of Goodness that literature and drama prepare us to live within the limits of human vulnerability. For Nussbaum, emotional exposure is not a threat to reason. It is a precondition for ethical development. The spectator does not learn through abstraction alone, but through attachment. The pain of watching Antigone bury her brother, or Lear descend into madness, or Willy Loman fracture under the weight of illusion, is not incidental. It is formative.

Aristotle’s account of mimesis differs markedly from Plato’s. He does not see imitation as mimicry. He sees it as clarification. The artist, in Aristotle’s view, imitates not what has already occurred, but what might occur according to the logic of probability or necessity. Theatre becomes a site not of replication but of distillation. It does not merely show reality; it interprets and refines it. The stage is not a place of deception. It is a space of recognition. Within a functioning polis, that kind of shared recognition is essential.

The Core Divide: Emotion, Truth, and the Function of Story

Beneath the disagreements among Plato, Socrates, and Aristotle is a question that continues to shape how we teach, interpret, and respond to art: Does it distort reality or reveal it? The answer, for each thinker, depends on how one understands the relationship between emotion and truth, imitation and insight, and individual perception and collective good.

Plato feared that the stage lured audiences away from the pursuit of truth by appealing to the unstable regions of the soul. Drama, in his view, persuades through illusion rather than reason. It encourages spectators to empathize with flawed characters and to feel emotions that are disproportionate or misdirected. This response, far from virtuous, is seen as corrosive to civic health. The mimetic arts, according to Plato, should be kept at a distance from the education of citizens, for they nurture confusion rather than clarity. As he insists in Republic X, the dramatist “has no knowledge worth mentioning” and yet may powerfully influence public emotion (X.600e–601a). The danger lies not only in the content of the play, but in the seductive form itself.

By contrast, Aristotle defends tragedy as a morally clarifying experience. Rather than pulling the spectator away from reason, it guides emotion toward understanding. In Poetics, he writes that through the emotions of pity and fear, tragedy effects the catharsis of these passions, a term often interpreted as purification, clarification, or release. Where Plato sees manipulation, Aristotle sees education. Art imitates action, not to deceive but to distill. It reveals the structures of human behavior, especially the consequences of ethical decisions, in ways that theoretical argument alone cannot. The tragic stage becomes a moral laboratory, offering spectators the opportunity to experience complex situations without suffering their real-life consequences.

Socrates, as depicted in Plato’s dialogues, withholds approval from artistic forms that do not provoke or permit rigorous dialectical examination. His skepticism emerges not from aesthetic disdain but from moral urgency. Truth, for Socrates, cannot be received passively; it must be earned through confrontation, reflection, and intellectual unrest. The Apology dramatizes this position through Socrates’ trial, where his refusal to perform repentance for the sake of appeasing the jury becomes a final defense of truth over spectacle. Even so, the dialogues in which he appears are themselves theatrical in structure; rich with irony, characterization, and rhetorical tension. Plato thus stages Socratic resistance within a literary form, a paradox that suggests the possibility of art not as deception, but as a vehicle for inquiry.

This tension between emotion and reason, between spectacle and scrutiny, persists well beyond antiquity. In the nineteenth century, the German philosopher G. W. F. Hegel revisits these ancient concerns in his Lectures on Aesthetics, offering one of the most influential modern accounts of art’s function. Where Plato feared illusion and Aristotle defended catharsis, Hegel seeks to reconcile both positions by proposing that art reveals Spirit (Geist), which he defines as the evolving self-awareness of human freedom as it unfolds through culture, history, and form. For Hegel, art is not merely decorative or moralizing. It is a mode of truth-telling, one that gives shape to the contradictions at the heart of human existence.

Tragedy, in particular, becomes the site where such contradictions are made visible. It is not a story of simple right and wrong, but of clashing ethical claims, including freedom versus necessity, private loyalty versus public duty, and the moral individual versus the lawful state. In Sophocles’ Antigone, for instance, Hegel sees no clear hero or villain. Instead, he finds what he calls a tragic collision (tragischer Konflikt), where “both are right, and both are wrong.” Antigone is justified in honoring her brother; Creon is justified in upholding the law. The tragedy lies in the fact that these principles, though noble on their own, cannot coexist. The power of the play does not lie in its resolution, but in its ability to embody irreconcilable truths and force the audience to bear witness to them.

Later thinkers, such as Martha Nussbaum, draw upon this tradition to argue for the ethical necessity of literature and drama in cultivating the moral imagination. In Love’s Knowledge and The Fragility of Goodness, Nussbaum asserts that emotions are not irrational intrusions upon reason, but modes of knowing in themselves. The capacity to feel pity, fear, grief, or admiration within a dramatic framework expands one’s understanding of the human condition. The arts, she argues, teach us not only what choices matter, but what it feels like to make them. This fusion of emotion and cognition positions theatre as a vital contributor to ethical development, not as its enemy.

Even the philosopher Hans-Georg Gadamer, whose work on hermeneutics emphasizes the dialogical nature of understanding, identifies aesthetic experience as an event of truth. In Truth and Method, he describes art as something that addresses the interpreter, not merely as an object of scrutiny, but as a partner in a conversation. Theatrical performance, in this light, is not simply a representation to be watched, but a provocation to which the audience must respond.

Across these traditions, the core divide remains sharply felt. Is theatre a seduction that disrupts reason, or a reckoning that illuminates it? Does it offer clarity, or does it merely entertain? Plato fears its capacity to bypass intellect. Aristotle defends its ability to deepen it. Socrates insists on its subordination to the examined life. Yet each, in different ways, acknowledges that theatre is never neutral. It touches the soul, shapes the city, and provokes the mind.

What theatre reveals may not always be comfortable or conclusive. Still, it remains one of the few places where contradiction is not only permitted, but required. Its purpose may never be singular. Its truth, however, continues to be hard-earned, unsettling, and urgently human.

Conclusion: The Curtain Rises on an Ancient Argument

The question of theatre’s purpose is not new. It has echoed through centuries of aesthetic theory and moral philosophy. This essay has explored how three foundational thinkers—Plato, Socrates, and Aristotle—approached the question from markedly different perspectives, each illuminating distinct tensions between representation, emotion, and truth.

Plato regarded theatre with deep suspicion. He saw it as twice removed from reality, capable of stirring emotion without offering knowledge. For him, the stage was not a place for moral formation, but a threat to it.

Socrates, as portrayed in Plato’s dialogues, was less dismissive than demanding. He withheld approval from artistic forms that did not submit to dialectical examination. Knowledge, in his view, could not be passively received; it had to be interrogated into existence. Only when performance provoked philosophical inquiry did it begin to serve a worthy end.

Aristotle, by contrast, offered a systematic defense of tragedy. He argued that theatre refines emotion rather than inflames it. Through catharsis, spectators undergo a kind of ethical rehearsal, arriving not at illusion but at recognition. For Aristotle, mimesis was not mimicry, but a form of clarification.

These positions continue to shape how we think about the function of storytelling: whether art should comfort or confront, reflect or refine, entertain or educate. Later philosophers such as Hegel, Nussbaum, and Gadamer have extended this conversation, suggesting that theatre remains relevant not because it resolves these tensions, but because it invites us to dwell within them.

To study theatre alongside philosophy is to treat art not as decoration, but as a mode of thought. The question of its purpose resists final answers. What the Greeks understood—and what these thinkers help us recover—is that the stage is never neutral. It is a site of consequence, where emotion and reason meet, and where the ethical stakes of representation are always in play.

The Space Between: Silence as Invitation and Rejection in the Plays of Harold Pinter

By Jill Szoo Wilson

Harold Pinter once remarked, “There are two silences. One when no word is spoken. The other when perhaps a torrent of language is being employed.” Among modern dramatists, few have explored the implications and resonances of silence with the same persistence and precision as Pinter. His plays are distinguished not only by their linguistic sparseness but also by their charged quietude. In Betrayal (1978), The Homecoming (1964), and The Dumb Waiter (1957), Pinter deploys silence not as an absence but as a palpable and often overwhelming presence. This presence operates relationally, capable of extending an emotional invitation or delivering a brutal rejection. Through careful attention to dialogue, subtext, and performance, this essay will demonstrate how Pinter constructs a theatrical world where silence functions as a principal mode of meaning-making. Particular attention will be paid to textual examples, actorly demands, and the ways in which silence shapes power dynamics, vulnerability, and emotional intimacy.

Harold Pinter. Photo credit: The Telegraph

Silence and Subtext: A Pinteresque Lexicon

Pinter’s contribution to twentieth-century drama is inseparable from his distinctive use of silence and subtext. Although he did not formally define the term, the “Pinter Pause” has become synonymous with his work. In script after script, these moments are carefully notated, drawing the reader and performer into the unspoken life of the character. Pauses and beats interrupt otherwise straightforward exchanges, drawing attention to what is not being said. These interstices are not neutral or empty. They are saturated with implication and possibility.

Pinter himself stated, “The speech we hear is an indication of that which we don’t hear” (Pinter, “Writing for the Theatre,” in Various Voices: Prose, Poetry, Politics 1948–2005). In his dramaturgy, language is not a transparent vehicle of communication. It is instead a defense mechanism, a smokescreen, and a performance of control. Within and around the spoken word exists an undercurrent of subtext—unvoiced thoughts, resisted emotions, or intentions obscured by fear or duplicity. In Pinter’s world, subtext is not an accessory to dialogue. It is the terrain upon which relationships unfold.

Actors and directors must contend with this layered approach. Every silence is a site of potential energy. A pause may represent hesitation, fear, contempt, longing, or calculation. The same moment may carry contradictory meanings, depending on context and performance. Subtext thus becomes a shifting field of interpretation. Its mutability is what grants Pinter’s work both its dramatic tension and its psychological complexity.

Betrayal: The Silence of What Goes Unsaid

The structure of Betrayal itself constitutes an act of subversion. Told in reverse chronology, the play invites the audience to move backward in time, tracing a failed affair to its inception. This narrative inversion heightens the impact of silence, as each scene is haunted by the knowledge of what will come. The silences in Betrayal are suffused with retrospective meaning. They are not only expressive of the characters’ present discomfort or confusion but also suggestive of what the audience already knows but the characters have not yet discovered.

In the opening scene of Betrayal, which takes place in 1977, Emma and Jerry meet in a pub, two years after the end of their affair. The audience quickly learns that Emma has just recently told her husband, Robert, about the affair—only two days before this meeting with Jerry. The chronology is emotionally disorienting: the affair has long ended, yet its consequences are still unfolding in real time. The meeting is steeped in residual tension and mutual discomfort, marked by Emma’s cryptic disclosures and Jerry’s halting responses. Their dialogue is spare, marked by hesitations and omissions. Emma says, “Yes. We had lunch.” A pause follows. She then adds, “He told me.” She is referring to the fact that Robert has told her he knows about the affair. Jerry responds with surprise: “He told you?” Emma confirms, “Yes.” Jerry, visibly shaken, asks, “When?” and Emma replies, “Two days ago.” The audience is made to linger in these brief silences, each one a site of compressed history. In those moments of quiet, the viewer is invited to contemplate the emotional cost of betrayal, the weight of unspoken guilt, and the residue of unresolved intimacy. These silences create a space in which the audience can sense the fragility of the relationship and the distance that now separates these former lovers. The emotional discomfort becomes palpable as the audience is asked to fill in what is deliberately left unsaid. These lines do not simply report a past event. They reopen a wound and expose the lingering tension beneath the surface civility. Emma’s short responses simultaneously invite Jerry into a shared reckoning and withhold the emotional clarity he seems to seek. Her reluctance to elaborate becomes a form of control, a means of resisting vulnerability while exposing the emotional rupture between them.

Jerry’s silences throughout the play are equally instructive. When confronted with uncomfortable truths, he often retreats into silence rather than risk emotional exposure. The pauses he employs do not indicate a lack of thought. On the contrary, they suggest an overabundance of conflicting feelings—regret, guilt, desire, and nostalgia. Silence, for him, becomes a form of resistance against both judgment and self-revelation.

As the play moves backward in time, the silences accumulate emotional weight. What is left unsaid becomes more significant than what is verbalized. The affair itself is not simply a story of physical intimacy or romantic connection. It is a narrative of missed opportunities, unspoken grievances, and repressed emotions. Silence, in this context, functions as the grammar of loss.

The Homecoming: Silence as Power and Resistance

While Betrayal explores the emotional dimensions of silence, The Homecoming foregrounds its political and psychological uses. Set in a working-class household in North London, the play revolves around the return of Teddy and his wife Ruth to Teddy’s family home. The male characters engage in ongoing contests of power, often articulated through cryptic dialogue and sudden silences. In this setting, speech is used as a form of assertion, while silence becomes an even more potent means of control.

Lenny, one of Teddy’s brothers, exemplifies this dynamic. In a particularly well-known monologue, he recounts an encounter with a woman in Soho. Midway through the speech, he pauses: “So I decided, all things considered, to take a walk round the park.” A silence follows. He continues, “On my way I passed a woman. I mean she was a girl, really.” The silence here performs multiple functions. It draws the listener in, interrupts the narrative flow, and heightens the suspense. More significantly, it allows Lenny to assert dominance over his audience. He controls not only the conversation but also the rhythm and emotional trajectory of the scene.

Ruth’s use of silence is markedly different. Throughout much of the play, she speaks little. Her stillness, however, unsettles the men. In scenes where she is questioned or spoken about, her refusal to respond transforms her into a figure of mystery and power. When she does speak, her words carry extraordinary weight precisely because they are so infrequent. In the climactic negotiation over whether she will remain in the house and under what terms, Ruth’s silences function as a form of authorship. Through her quiet, she exerts agency not by confrontation but by redirection. When the men in the household propose that she remain with them in a newly defined role, Ruth does not protest, negotiate, or assert power in any traditional sense. Instead, she listens, responds selectively, and maintains long stretches of silence that significantly shift the tone of the conversation. These silences draw attention to her presence and force the men to interpret her intentions without the benefit of clarification. In this way, she assumes control of the situation by unsettling their expectations and refusing to meet them on their terms. Her stillness becomes its own language; one that conveys dominance without defiance, and influence without aggression.

The silence in The Homecoming is not merely dramatic punctuation. It reveals the brutal economy of emotional exchange within the family. What is not said is often more violent than what is. The pauses expose resentments, alliances, and threats. In this environment, silence becomes a language of power.

The Dumb Waiter: Silence in the Absurd and the Menacing

Written more than a decade before Betrayal, The Dumb Waiter demonstrates Pinter’s early command of dramatic silence. The play features two hitmen, Ben and Gus, confined to a basement room as they await instructions from an unseen employer. Their exchanges are fragmented and mundane, yet frequently interrupted by long, uneasy silences. These silences are not incidental. They function as structural elements, shaping the play’s rhythm and establishing its psychological tone.

In one exchange, Gus asks, “What time is he getting in touch?” A silence follows. Ben replies, “He won’t be long now.” The simplicity of the dialogue conceals its emotional complexity. The pause that precedes Ben’s reply is not merely a moment of thought. It is a withholding—a quiet act of evasion that reveals more than it conceals. Earlier in the same scene, Gus ventures a more vulnerable question: “You ever get the feeling that the job’s getting a bit, well, out of hand?” Ben offers no response. A long pause ensues. These accumulating silences become progressively more charged, reflecting both a growing uncertainty about the nature of their assignment and a refusal—on Ben’s part—to confront the moral and emotional implications of their work.

As the tension escalates, Gus becomes increasingly unsettled. He presses for answers, asking, “Who’s it going to be today, then?” and “Why don’t we ever see them?” His questions, filled with quiet desperation, are met with clipped replies or deflection. Ben’s silences take on the quality of denial. He refuses to acknowledge the absurdity of their task, the fear that is gradually taking hold of Gus, or the deterioration of their professional rapport. His minimal responses and long pauses create emotional distance, allowing him to shield himself from reflection and discomfort.

Rather than engage with the rising tension or the ethical ambiguity of their assignment, Ben falls back on monosyllables and stoic quiet. In doing so, he preserves the appearance of order in a situation that is steadily unraveling. The silence between the two men is no longer an empty interval. It becomes a charged space—a manifestation of dread, estrangement, and the repression of conscience. Through this increasingly oppressive silence, Pinter dramatizes the collapse of not only language, but also of mutual understanding and moral coherence.

The dumb waiter apparatus itself introduces an additional layer of communicative breakdown. It delivers cryptic food orders from above, devoid of human presence or explanation. The absence of a voice renders the authority both faceless and omnipresent. Communication becomes mechanical, one-directional, and dehumanizing. The men are spoken to, but have no one to answer. This impersonal exchange heightens the atmosphere of menace and absurdity. Silence, in this context, is not passive. It is a form of control.

As the play progresses, the interplay between speech and silence reflects the characters’ deepening existential uncertainty. Their language fragments. Pauses lengthen. Repetitions proliferate. Meaning begins to disintegrate. In this context, silence becomes more than a tool of tension. It signals psychological erosion. The play’s final moments, stripped of meaningful dialogue, leave the audience suspended in a silence that points not to resolution, but to potential violence, left unspoken, yet palpably imminent.

Acting Pinter: Precision and Presence

To perform Pinter’s text is to engage in an exercise of rigorous restraint. Actors must imbue each silence with intention. Peter Hall, a longtime collaborator of Pinter’s, noted that “the pauses are not technical; they are emotional.” This observation captures the essence of the challenge. A pause must never be empty. It must always be inhabited by thought, memory, resistance, or desire.

In Betrayal, the actor portraying Jerry must balance conflicting emotions—longing, remorse, and confusion—often within a single line or beat. In The Homecoming, Ruth’s silences must destabilize the entire dramatic environment. The actor must convey strength, ambiguity, and erotic charge without overt display. In The Dumb Waiter, Gus’s gradual descent into fear must be readable in his stillness, his hesitations, and his silences.

This level of specificity demands not only technical skill but profound emotional awareness. The actor must trust the text and the audience. The silences are not gaps to be filled. They are spaces to be honored. Each beat must emerge from a lived internal process. Only then can the full resonance of Pinter’s language—and its absence—be realized.

Conclusion

Harold Pinter’s use of silence across Betrayal, The Homecoming, and The Dumb Waiter reveals a sophisticated dramaturgy rooted in the complexities of human communication. Silence in these works is never passive. It is always expressive, always consequential. It functions relationally, capable of drawing characters together or forcing them apart. It expresses vulnerability, power, resistance, and ambiguity.

For actors, these silences represent some of the most demanding material in modern theatre. They require a commitment to subtext, an understanding of emotional timing, and a capacity for internal stillness. For audiences, the experience of these plays becomes one of heightened attention. The silence insists on active listening. It challenges the expectation that meaning resides in speech alone.

In an age characterized by constant noise and distraction, Pinter’s theatrical silences stand as radical interventions. They create space: space for thought, for emotion, for recognition. In doing so, they reaffirm the power of theatre not only to represent but to embody the human condition. Silence, in Pinter’s hands, is not the absence of meaning. It is its most concentrated form.

Poem: Slowness

There is a secret bond between slowness and memory, between speed and forgetting. A man is walking down the street. At a certain moment, he tries to recall something, but the recollection escapes him. Automatically, he slows down.

Meanwhile, a person who wants to forget a disagreeable incident he has just lived through starts unconsciously to speed up his pace, as if he were trying to distance himself from a thing still too close to him in time.

In existential mathematics that experience takes the form of two basic equations: The degree of slowness is directly proportional to the intensity of memory; the degree of speed is directly proportional to the intensity of forgetting.
Milan Kundera, Slowness

Kundera, man. This guy just knows how to pierce into and extend a metaphor.

The question his thoughts inspire in me today is this: when we travel from the present moment to our memories–or an imagined future–does the speed of life around us change? How do we move from our imaginations to our current surroundings? Slowly or with speed?

Slowness
By Jill Szoo Wilson

A breeze blows through my window 
proclaims,
"I wants to write,"
as it lifts the pages of my notepad–
the crinkling sound of paper–
no–
the sound of pages running across a sidewalk
though no footsteps follow behind. 

Free, the pages tumble
twist into a roll–
double back salto tucked with a triple twist–
a pigeon holds up a sign, 
"7 out of 10."

It had to be the pigeon. 
No one else was paying attention. 

The fluttering of the notebook page
pulls me back into the moment–
how many sounds have I forgotten to hear?

Do I hear the past
more loudly than today?
How many hours echo through a chamber of disparate chatter?

A dog is barking, 
a squirrel's claws are tapping the inside of my ceramic pot,
I'm humming a song that was sung to me once,
the pigeon is bored–
he flys away.  

©Jill Szoo Wilson, 2023

The Power of Forgiveness: Eva Mozes Kor’s Call for a New Human Right

In the fall of 2006, Eva Mozes Kor, Holocaust survivor and Mengele twin, received an unexpected invitation that would set her on a new path in her journey to advocate for forgiveness as a human right. Dr. Joan Lescinski, president of Saint Mary-of-the-Woods College in Terre Haute, Indiana, invited Eva to a private lunch. Eva, ever curious, arrived dressed in her favorite bright blue suit, eager to learn more. Little did she know, this would be the beginning of an incredible journey, one that would shape not only her legacy but also the conversation around emotional healing and forgiveness on a global scale.

Eva Mozes Kor, photo taken by Jill Szoo Wilson — Eva Mozes Kor. Jill Szoo Wilson took this photo at an NBC studio in Indiana.

A Life-Changing Invitation

As Eva stepped onto the campus, the vibrant fall colors of the trees created a beautiful backdrop for the day ahead. Dr. Lescinski explained that the board of directors had voted to honor Eva with an honorary doctorate for her work in forgiveness and had chosen her to be the commencement speaker in May 2008. It was a rare and deeply meaningful recognition, one that both humbled and surprised Eva, knowing the weight of the responsibility that lay ahead of her.

But this honor would not come quickly. The process took almost a year and a half to prepare. During this time, Eva decided to dive deeper into the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), especially since the declaration did not address the emotional pain inflicted on survivors and victims of atrocities.

The Idea of an Addendum

Eva, alongside Kiel Majewski, researched the UDHR and realized that while the declaration addressed the physical and civil rights of individuals, it failed to address the emotional trauma that people, especially victims of genocide, carry for most of their lives. This led Eva to propose an addendum to the UDHR, one that would acknowledge the human right to live free of emotional pain inflicted by others and by life itself.

A Legacy of Resilience: Saint Mother Theodore Guerin

As Eva prepared for her speech, she reflected on the perseverance and strength of those who built the foundation of the institution she was addressing. One such person was Saint Mother Theodore Guerin, the founder of Saint Mary-of-the-Woods College. Guerin’s own journey, filled with adversity and relentless determination, resonated deeply with Eva.

Saint Mother Theodore Guerin, a French nun, traveled across the Atlantic Ocean in 1840 to establish what would later become Saint Mary-of-the-Woods College in Terre Haute, Indiana. She was part of a group of Sisters of Providence sent by the Superior General of the Congregation of the Sisters of Providence in France to open a mission in the United States.

She and her fellow sisters arrived in the United States at a time when the country was still relatively young, and the area around Terre Haute was largely undeveloped. Despite facing numerous challenges, including language barriers, limited resources, and harsh conditions, Mother Theodore Guerin persevered and founded the college in 1840. Her vision and determination to provide education for women in the midwestern United States became a reality, and Saint Mary-of-the-Woods College was established.

Eva often reflected on how one person’s determination could spark lasting change. Guerin’s commitment to education, even in the face of hardship, was the very kind of perseverance Eva hoped to embody in her own work. As Guerin had never given up on her dream, Eva refused to give up on her vision for a world where emotional healing was recognized as a fundamental human right.

Eva’s Commencement Speech

In May 2008, Eva arrived at the commencement ceremony, accompanied by her son Dr. Alex Kor and her husband, Marius Kor (“Mickey”). The ceremony felt like another survival test, but Eva was resolute. She stood before the graduates, faculty, and board members, prepared to speak from her heart.

During her speech, Eva took a moment to reflect on her past, on the unimaginable horrors she endured as a ten-year-old girl in Auschwitz. Separated from her parents and two older sisters, Eva, along with her twin sister Miriam, was thrust into an environment of unspeakable cruelty. She shared the vivid memories of being shoved into filthy, overcrowded barracks, deprived of food, and subjected to the terrifying medical experiments led by Dr. Josef Mengele. But she also spoke of her defiance, the way she managed to survive after Mengele’s chilling prediction that she would be dead within two weeks following his lethal injection. Against all odds, Eva lived, and in the process, she learned the profound strength that kept her going (Kor, Surviving the Angel of Death).

Below is an excerpt from her speech:

You have come a long way, and so have I. Sixty four years ago at this time, I was a ten-year-old little girl, huddled with my twin sister, Miriam, in our filthy bunk beds crawling with lice and rats. We were starved for food, starved for human kindness, and starved for the love of the mothers and fathers we once had. We did know then that there was a United States of America. But I knew nothing about the state of Indiana, Terre Haute, Indiana, Saint-Mary-of-the-Woods-College, nor did I dream of receiving an honorary doctorate. In those days I dreamed of food and freedom, so all my energies focused on living one more day and surviving one more experiment [. . .] We arrived in Auschwitz in the Spring of 1944. Within 30 minutes we were ripped apart from my parents and two older sisters. Only my twin sister and I survived Auschwitz. I defied Mengele who said that I would be dead in two weeks after he injected me with a deadly germ, I defied Auschwitz, a factory of death, because I never gave up on myself nor on my dreams.

As she spoke to the graduates, she drew a powerful parallel between her survival and their own journeys. She reminded them that, like herself, they had persevered through challenges. The graduates had worked hard, faced their own struggles, and overcome personal obstacles to reach this moment of triumph. Eva’s words connected their achievements in the classroom to her own perseverance in the face of unspeakable violence. Both, she emphasized, were the result of relentless strength, the kind of resilience that endures and thrives even in the face of overwhelming adversity.

The Power of Forgiveness

Eva then shared a life lesson that she held dear: “Forgive your worst enemy, and forgive everybody who has hurt you. It will heal your soul and set you free.” Her journey to forgiveness, which began on January 27, 1995, was pivotal not only in her own healing but in her advocacy for others to release emotional pain through forgiveness (Kor, CANDLES Foundation).

As part of her speech, Eva called upon the students, faculty, and staff at Saint Mary-of-the-Woods College to sign an addendum to the UDHR, which would advocate for the right to emotional healing through forgiveness. This proposed addendum would be sent to the United Nations, the President of the United States, and the Helsinki Human Rights Commission. Eva felt confident that Saint Mother Theodore Guerin, the founder of the college, was smiling down in approval of this effort.

The Addendum to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights

Eva’s proposed addendum stated the following:

Right to Freedom from Emotional Pain: Every person has the human right to live free from the emotional pain and burden imposed by others, society, or life itself.
Forgiveness as a Path to Freedom: Forgiveness is a viable option for achieving that freedom and the human right to emotional well-being.
Personal and Universal: Forgiveness is a personal act of self-healing, a right that every person must claim for themselves. Each person has the right to forgive in their own time and on their own terms.
The Power of the Addendum: This addendum would serve as a beacon for anyone who has endured pain, offering them the right to transcend their suffering by choosing forgiveness.

Conclusion: A Call for Healing

As the panel of faculty and students signed the addendum, Eva felt a sense of hope. It was not just a symbolic gesture; it was a call to action for everyone who has suffered. Eva’s speech was not only about her own personal forgiveness but also about empowering others to take control of their emotional freedom.

“I did not want to carry the burden of hatred with me. I wanted to live and not just survive.” – Eva Mozes Kor

The event and the addendum were a culmination of Eva’s belief that emotional healing, through the act of forgiveness, was just as vital as any civil or political right. She challenged everyone to embrace forgiveness, not only to heal themselves but to contribute to a world that acknowledges the emotional scars we carry and the universal right to find peace.

Kiel Majewski worked as the Director of Research at the CANDLES Holocaust Museum and Education Center. His role involved conducting research related to the Holocaust, specifically focusing on the Mengele Twins and other aspects of the museum’s mission.

When You Have to Forgive Between 1 and 1,000 Times

The difficult thing about forgiveness is how many times you have to do it.

You know the drill: you write a letter you’ll never send, trek to a place that used to mean something but now just stirs up hurt, and try to reclaim it as a spot you’re still allowed to love. You even hold a makeshift burning ceremony, tossing whatever’s left of what once mattered into the flickering flame of a windblown match—hoping, of course, that this will somehow make it all magically disappear and let you move on.

You call up your friends, your sister, your therapist, and maybe even your pastor—basically anyone who’ll listen—as you try to untangle the emotional mess someone left behind in your soul. Eventually, you convince yourself that you’ve talked it to death, done all the emotional gymnastics to understand, grieve, and accept. You think you’ve untangled the knot, and now—at last—you’re free! The sadness, pain, and the emotional bleed that’s been trickling down the back of your heart for weeks (or was it months? Years?) is all but gone. You’ve forgiven! Or at least, you really, really hope so.

Then one morning, it happens. You’re just going about your business when a song starts playing, and out of nowhere, your brain decides to remount a lavish production bringing the entire drama back from the dead. Or maybe you read a poetic passage that seems like it was written specifically to stir up the pain you thought you’d dealt with. But the most delightful moment? You’re just trying to get ready for the day, doing your makeup, and suddenly you feel that old, uninvited heat creeping up your neck—something the blush can’t hide. It colors your thoughts with a fiery red, and before you know it, you’re back in that moment, imagining all the things you should’ve said, how you could’ve responded, and how maybe—just maybe—you should’ve thrown something through their window. But you didn’t, because you’d already committed to forgiving them. Now you’re left with the regret of not throwing things within a timeframe that would have been appropriate in relation to when that person was a jerk. Missed opportunities, am I right?

So, you missed the chance to throw things. You’ve ridden the high of the moral high ground to its natural end. Now, you’re faced, once more, with a choice: can I forgive them again? Or is this the end of the line for me when it comes to freedom from the jail cell they constructed for me?

Here’s what I think – we often view forgiveness wrongly. We think it’s a choice we make when, really, it’s an attitude of the heart. We think it’s an extending of the hand to a fellow human being, or even a hand over our own hearts, but really it’s a lifting of the hand to God. A lifting of the hand and a bowing of the knee.

Sometimes forgiveness is sitting on a rock at the edge of a trail and remembering that I do not have the power to dissolve my own pain the moment I want it gone. Instead, it’s a prayer, “Lord, here I am again with these memories. Here I am again with a chasm in the center of my softest internal space feeling so angry I can barely hear the birds singing in the trees above my head. I can’t forgive today and I hope you will forgive me for that.“

I know that rock well. But I also know God well enough to understand that when I bring my chasm to Him, He breathes water into it. Hear me out: imagine an empty gorge and then imagine it filling with crystal clear water. The depths still exist but God’s mercy grants me the space to swim. To be bouyant even in the midst of the depths below me. He allows me to sit with my pain while also knowing I won’t drown.

Forgiveness is swimming with the memories in your mind while trusting in God’s all-encompassing buoyancy to get you to the other side of the divide. It’s choosing to stop treading water and, instead, turning over on your back to float. To look up at the sky, feel the coolness of the trickles as they ripple below your body, and to whisper, “Well, this hurts but it’s also really beautiful here. God, I trust you.”

Nothing is ever just one thing.

Forgiveness can feel scary, daunting, and nearly impossible. It can also be empowering, joyful, and freeing.

One thing it isn’t is easy.

In the next few weeks, I’ll be writing a lot about Holocaust survivor and Mengele Twin, Eva Mozes Kor. Walking with and learning from her gave me a treasure trove of questions and ideas on all kinds of topics. First and foremost, forgiveness. What you’ll see in my writing is that I deeply respected her, loved her, and was ever-amused by her resilient and feisty spirit! You’ll also see that we didn’t always agree on what forgiveness is or how to achieve it, but we always listened, laughed, and learned with one another.

❤️, Jill Szoo Wilson

(Originally posted February 22, 2025)

Forgiveness After the Battle: Eva Mozes Kor’s Path to Reclaiming Peace

The problem with survival is that there are other people in the world. If we were simply dropped off in the middle of this jungle called life, with a go-bag, some water, and a means to make fire, we would most certainly get through life with stressful stories but hardly any trauma. For example, if I had to wrestle a bear to the ground because he took my last piece of food, I would come out of that fight banged up but not traumatized. Nearly dead, yes, but with scratches on my arms that would eventually heal. Bears are not the problem. It is people. Wolves in sheep’s clothing.

Eva Mozes Kor and Jill Szoo Wilson met for the first time in Springfield, Missouri, in 2013.

When people get involved, survival shifts. We move from survival as an instinct (wrestling bears for food because we have to eat) to survival despite our instincts, fighting human perpetrators because the violence they bring is not just something we recover from; it is something we live with, long after the battle is over. This is where justice comes in. As humans, we have a strong need for justice. Our first instinct is not usually forgiveness, but rather to seek an equally proportional measure of punishment for those who have wronged us. “An eye for an eye,” right?

I have heard it said that forgiveness is about taking someone off your hook and putting them onto God’s hook. I believe that to be true. But for the sake of this article, let us focus on the hook itself. How can we find peace if we are still holding someone in contempt in a court of our own? How can we find peace when we are the judge, jury, and executioner?

This brings us to forgiveness, a concept that can feel both impossible and liberating. It is not about erasing the past; it is about freeing ourselves from its hold. I began to understand this through my time with Holocaust survivor and Mengele Twin Eva Mozes Kor. In her words and actions, Eva taught me that forgiveness is not an act of excusing the wrongs done to us; it is about choosing to free ourselves from the weight of anger and resentment, allowing us to heal and move forward.

Eva spent her life sharing a powerful message: forgiveness can free us from the pain of the past. But forgiveness is not a simple act, nor is it always possible in the heat of survival. In candid reflections, she discussed how complex and difficult it is to find peace, not just for oneself but for future generations.

Eva was often criticized by fellow survivors for her approach to forgiveness, which she saw as a conscious decision to move beyond the traditional idea of simply “forgive and forget.” For Eva, forgiveness was not about erasing the past or excusing the wrongs committed; it was about choosing to release the grip that hatred and resentment held on her, giving herself the freedom to heal.

She also emphasized that forgiveness cannot be rushed. It is not something one can jump into in the heat of battle or while still fighting for survival. Only after we feel safe, after the danger has passed, can we even begin to consider forgiveness. This understanding was central to Eva’s belief that forgiveness is a long, deliberate process that only becomes possible when we feel secure. For her, the journey did not even begin until four decades after liberation from the camps (Kor). That delay is a testament to the time it takes to heal and to reclaim one’s sense of safety before forgiveness becomes possible.

Psychological research on trauma supports Eva’s view that forgiveness is often a complex and gradual process, particularly when individuals are still grappling with the effects of trauma. Dr. Bessel van der Kolk explains that “trauma robs you of the capacity to forgive, because forgiveness requires a sense of safety, and trauma creates a world where safety is impossible” (The Body Keeps the Score, 2014). This aligns with Eva’s belief that forgiveness only becomes possible when the individual feels secure enough to step away from the “battlefield mentality” of survival.

Similarly, Dr. Judith Herman emphasizes the critical role safety plays in the recovery process. She asserts that trauma survivors must first find safety and regain a sense of control before they can begin processing and healing their wounds (Trauma and Recovery, 1992). Only after this foundational stage can they consider forgiveness, not as an immediate reaction but as part of a longer journey toward reclaiming their emotional well-being and sense of power.

Survival First: The Battlefield Mentality

Eva’s message begins with a clear understanding of human nature. She explains that the survival instinct is innate: “We are all born to maintain life at any cost.” This survival instinct shapes our actions in profound ways, particularly when our lives are at risk.

For example, she argued that forgiving someone who is pointing a gun at your head would make no sense, because you would be dead before you could even say the words. The instinct to protect oneself overrides any consideration of forgiveness in that moment. Eva called this the “battlefield mentality.” In this context, forgiveness is impossible until the threat has passed, the battle is over, and we feel secure again. Only then can we begin to consider forgiveness.

This aligns with the fight-or-flight response, first described by Dr. Walter Cannon (Bodily Changes in Pain, Hunger, Fear and Rage, 1915). Cannon’s research explains how the body’s instinctive reaction to danger prioritizes survival over all other actions, including the cognitive decision to forgive. Only once the immediate threat has passed and we feel safe can we process our emotions and consider forgiveness.

Forgiveness After the Battle: When We Are Safe

Eva believed that for Holocaust survivors living in Israel, or those still coping with the immediate concerns of survival, forgiveness was often out of reach. Many survivors continue to face the realities of their trauma, and for some, the environment in which they live, still grappling with insecurity and violence, means they are not yet able to move beyond the pain. The challenges they face are not just historical; they are still navigating a present shaped by fear, uncertainty, and the need for protection. Eva recognized this complexity and believed that forgiveness could not be forced while survivors are still in a state of ongoing defense, where survival is still their top priority.

Historical context supports Eva’s view. The post-war period in Israel, for example, was one where many survivors faced not only the trauma of their past but also the pressures of rebuilding in a country still fighting for its survival. In such an environment, the idea of forgiveness or reconciliation often took a back seat to the immediate needs for safety and security. Scholars like Hannah Arendt (The Human Condition, 1958) and Natan P. Lasky (Holocaust and Memory, 2001) note that forgiveness in the face of unresolved trauma and ongoing conflict is incredibly difficult, if not impossible, because the wounds remain fresh and the environment does not offer the conditions for healing.

Eva also pointed to the cycle of pain that continues when survivors, unable to forgive, pass on their hatred and distrust. Survivors who choose not to forgive often reject anything related to their oppressors, such as avoiding German products, refusing to visit Germany, or not trusting Germans. This perpetuates the pain and prevents healing. Eva challenged them: “Do you want your children and grandchildren to carry and feel your pain for the rest of their lives, or would you like to give them another inheritance?”

The Inheritance of Forgiveness

Eva reflected on her own family, explaining how her two children responded differently to her philosophy of forgiveness. One embraced it, while the other did not. Despite the differences, Eva believed forgiveness was a choice that could be discovered later in life, even if not immediately embraced. She always said, “I forgive in my name only.” For Eva, forgiveness was a personal decision, one that could not be imposed on others. She recognized that each person must find their own path to healing, and that path may look different for everyone.

She urged survivors of any trauma, whether Holocaust survivors or survivors of child abuse, neglect, or molestation, to consider the possibility of forgiveness. Eva shared how the deep pain caused by betrayal can linger long after the event, but also how releasing that pain is possible. Her advice for those suffering from trauma was simple: imagine how it would feel if the pain had never occurred. Then, shift your perspective and ask, “How would you feel if you could overcome that pain by forgiving those who caused it?”

The Letter of Forgiveness: A Path Toward Freedom

For those struggling to forgive, Eva had a practical suggestion: write a letter to the person who caused the pain. The letter did not need to be sent; it was a personal act of release. Writing a letter of forgiveness allows the survivor to work through the pain, step by step, with the intention of breaking free from its grip.

Research in expressive writing supports Eva’s approach. Dr. James Pennebaker has found that writing about traumatic experiences can significantly reduce stress and improve emotional well-being (Opening Up by Writing It Down, 2016). In his studies, he demonstrated that individuals who write about their emotions and trauma often experience greater emotional clarity and a decrease in physical symptoms related to stress. This form of writing helps individuals process difficult emotions in a controlled, private way, which can be especially beneficial for survivors of trauma who may find it difficult to talk about their pain.

Eva reassured her audience: “What can this silly letter accomplish? Try it, what can you lose? Only your pain. And if you don’t like how it feels without that pain, you can always take it back, but you will not miss it.” This simple act, she believed, could free people from the constant burden of past trauma and open the door to healing. Studies have shown that writing can lead to emotional relief, helping individuals feel lighter and less burdened by their past. By putting the pain into words, survivors can begin to regain control over their emotions and take steps toward freedom.

A Call to Action

Eva’s message is about reclaiming your freedom. She taught me that forgiveness is not about excusing the past; it is about letting go of the weight that keeps you from moving forward. Traveling with her through Poland, Hungary, and Romania from 2013 to 2017, I saw how forgiveness gave her the power to heal, to find peace where pain once lived.

Her words often echoed in my mind as I confronted my own pain. “What would my life be like if I could forgive?” I realized that forgiveness is not just about releasing anger or resentment; it is about letting go of fear and the weight of trying to fix things I cannot control. I spent so much time feeling responsible for making everything right, but I realized that I cannot be in charge of justice across the world. What I can do is release my obligation to correct things beyond my reach. Forgiveness became the key to letting go of that burden, and in doing so, I was able to reclaim peace for myself.

June Hunt defines forgiveness as “a deliberate choice to release feelings of resentment or vengeance toward a person or group who has harmed you” (How to Forgive… When You Don’t Feel Like It, 2008). Hunt emphasizes that forgiveness is not about condoning the offense but choosing to release the hold that the hurt has over your life. This aligns with Eva’s perspective, where forgiveness is an act of personal freedom, not an act of excusing past wrongs. For Eva, forgiveness was about freeing herself from the weight of past pain, and choosing peace over the perpetuation of hurt.

Through her example, I understood that forgiveness is a choice, a choice that lets you take back the power lost to fear, anger, and the constant desire to control outcomes. It is not an easy choice, but it is one worth making. Because in the end, forgiveness is a powerful act of reclaiming your life, of releasing the past’s grip on your soul and embracing the peace you deserve. It is not about excusing the wrongs or forgetting the pain; it is about choosing to rise above them, to break free from the chains of resentment and fear, and to step forward into a future unburdened by what you cannot change.

Eva Mozes Kor, the Scheisskommando, and the Cost of One More Day

From 2013 to 2017, I traveled with Holocaust survivor and Mengele Twin Eva Mozes Kor, following her story across Poland, Hungary, and Romania. I wanted to learn, not just from her words, but from the places themselves. I walked the dirt roads where she grew up in Romania, stood on the concrete where her family waited to be shoved into cattle cars in Șimleu Silvaniei, and pressed my hand against the cold stone of Block 10 in Auschwitz, where Dr. Mengele once looked down at her and said, “It’s a shame she’s so young. She only has a couple weeks to live.”

Eva never told me what to think. She never tied things up neatly. She only asked me to look, to listen, to understand: survival, real survival, was never just about strength. It was in the details. The ability to step over a dead body and keep moving, because stopping meant risking your own. The skill of slipping a potato from the commissary without getting caught. The discipline to dissociate, not from the rats that scurried over her at night, but from the fear of them, because sleep was necessary, and fear could not be allowed to strip her of the strength sleep afforded her.

It’s easy to imagine survival as something straightforward, a matter of strength or willpower. But in Auschwitz, survival was a negotiation, a constant weighing of the impossible.

“What would you do to survive? You can’t really know until your life is actually in danger. It was easy to die here. Survival took every ounce of strength you could muster.”

Standing in the humid summer breeze at Auschwitz-Birkenau, I contemplated Eva Kor’s words.

It is easy to die. It is difficult to live. Life is fragile. We come from the dust and to the dust we return. Beginnings and endings are consistently marked by celebration, comedy, tragedy, and pathos. Middles are different. The middle of a thing is where the human spirit grows. Middles churn with questions, collide with conflicting purposes, strain toward progress, and wrestle with the weight of stagnation.

Birkenau was an epicenter where middles and endings met. Survival was not simply a contest won by the fittest. It was a succession of choices; choices that rang in the soul of each individual, like the sound of a train dragging its way through the countryside on tracks of steel. Some survived by cultivating their minds to be like the birds that flew above the blood and mire. Some survived by making themselves useful. Some survived by climbing into a trough of human waste to escape the eye of the enemy. Because even here, in filth, there was something worth grasping, something worth staying alive for.

Latrines: A Place of Filth and Refuge

The Nazis allowed prisoners two visits to the latrines per day, one in the morning, one in the evening. That was it. The rest of the time, men, women, and children had to relieve themselves wherever they stood. The ground they walked on bore witness to their labor, their suffering, and the last remnants of their dignity.

The air of Birkenau was thick with an unholy stench: human waste, rancid sweat, the sharp tang of blood, and the sickly-sweet rot of decay. It clung to the skin, crawled into the lungs, and settled deep in the gut like a living thing, an inescapable reminder that suffering here had a scent. And with every breath, sickness followed. Dysentery oozed through the camp, rotting stomachs from the inside out, turning each bite of watery broth into a calculated risk, each swallow a step closer to collapse.

And yet, there was an odd paradox: working in the latrines was considered one of the best jobs in the camp.

Imagine a world where standing in human waste meant protection. In Auschwitz, it did.

The Paradox of the Latrine Workers

The latrines were a guard-free zone. And so, in this rancid, airless place, there was something invaluable: privacy.

For those assigned to the latrines, the absence of guards offered a rare and fragile freedom. In the stench and shadows, prisoners bartered stolen scraps, exchanged whispered news, and conspired in low voices. Some sought fleeting moments of physical intimacy, an urgent defiance against a world that had stripped them of choice. In a place built to erase them, the latrines became one of the few spaces where prisoners could still claim their own existence.

Here, in the thick of filth, they remembered they were still human.

The Work of the Scheisskommando

Their job was simple: lift the heavy concrete slabs covering the waste pits, lower themselves inside, and scoop out the accumulated filth.

If you’ve ever gagged while cleaning out your refrigerator after leaving leftovers for too long, imagine standing waist-deep in a sea of decay. The air was thick, humid, and alive with flies. The stench coated everything, clinging to their skin and settling into the creases of their clothes like an unshakable second skin.

But for those who had this job, it was a lifeline. They weren’t being worked to death in the fields. They weren’t being lined up for random executions. They weren’t subjected to the relentless gaze of the SS officers who delighted in tormenting prisoners for sport.

The latrines, for all their horrors, offered something rare in Auschwitz: predictability.

A Dignity That Refused to Die

Powerlessness is a disease that seeps into the soul. Strip away respect, dignity, and basic rights, and two things happen: the perpetrator swells with power, and the victim shrinks.

Allowing prisoners to stand ankle-deep in their own filth was not just a byproduct of poor sanitation, it was an act of control. The SS guards didn’t have to lift their legs and urinate on the prisoners to show their dominance. They merely had to stand still while the prisoners did it to themselves.

But in the darkest places, even where dignity was supposed to die, the will to live persisted. The latrine workers of Auschwitz-Birkenau found ways to carve out a space for themselves, to steal back fragments of their humanity, to keep moving forward when everything around them said they should fall.

Consider if you will, a woman falling from the sky into the deep ocean. She is surrounded by foreign creatures, disoriented by the sounds and weight of the water. She is not a fish. She has no gills. The water is her enemy. It presses on her lungs, reminding her with each second that this place does not belong to her.

She has a choice. She can panic and sink, or she can swim.

This is the paradox of survival. This is the choice of the Scheisskommando.

The Final Question

Eva Mozes Kor once asked a group of people this question as we stood inside a latrine at Birkenau:

“How many of you could survive here? What would you do to survive?”

Survival in the death camps was never about dignity. The prisoners carried that within them, untouchable even in the face of brutality. What was at stake was something else entirely. Life in exchange for one more day. Hopelessness held at bay for a sliver of hope. The certainty of an ending deferred, just long enough to stay in the middle a little longer.

We like to think we know ourselves. That in the face of unspeakable horror, we would know what to do. That we would have a plan. A way to resist. A way to bring order to chaos.

But the truth is, we don’t know.

We can’t know.

Not until we’re the ones at the edge of the pit, staring into the void.

Not until survival is no longer a question, but the only thing left.

Prologue

The Studio and the Threshold of Imagination

Prologue: Playing Willy Loman

Introduction

Section I: Early Formations of Selfhood

Section II: The Rise and Fracture of Familial Expectations

Section III: Memory, Time, and Psychological Regression

Section IV: The Psychology of Shame and Withdrawal

Section V: Aftermath and Absence

Conclusion: The Dreamer and the Dream

Further Reading

Introduction

Plato on Theatre: Emotion Without Reason

Socrates (via Plato): Interrogation Over Imitation

Aristotle: Theatre Teaches Us How to Feel Wisely

The Core Divide: Emotion, Truth, and the Function of Story

Conclusion: The Curtain Rises on an Ancient Argument

Silence and Subtext: A Pinteresque Lexicon

Betrayal: The Silence of What Goes Unsaid

The Homecoming: Silence as Power and Resistance

The Dumb Waiter: Silence in the Absurd and the Menacing

Acting Pinter: Precision and Presence

Conclusion

A Life-Changing Invitation

The Idea of an Addendum

A Legacy of Resilience: Saint Mother Theodore Guerin

Eva’s Commencement Speech

The Power of Forgiveness

The Addendum to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights

Conclusion: A Call for Healing

Further Reading

Survival First: The Battlefield Mentality

Forgiveness After the Battle: When We Are Safe

The Inheritance of Forgiveness

The Letter of Forgiveness: A Path Toward Freedom

A Call to Action

Further Reading

Latrines: A Place of Filth and Refuge

The Paradox of the Latrine Workers

The Work of the Scheisskommando

A Dignity That Refused to Die

The Final Question