Why We Return: Repetition and Remembrance in Elliot: A Soldier's Fugue

Authors

Carly Shaw

Abstract

In lieu of an abstract, the first paragraph of the essay follows:

At a Theater of War production of Ajax, when Artistic Director Bryan Doerries asked the audience what Sophocles' motive could have been for depicting such a traumatic narrative of war, a junior enlisted soldier raised his hand and replied, "He wrote it to boost morale." When questioned further about the efficacy of morale-boosting in a play about madness and suicide, the soldier replied, "It's the truth … and we're all watching it together."¹ The truth of trauma and mental anguish as prevalent experiences among war veterans is well-documented: for instance, psychiatrist Jonathan Shay, who works with veterans from the Vietnam War, writes that roughly "three-quarters of a million heavy combat veterans from Vietnam are still alive today, of whom a quarter million are still suffering."² By suffering, of course, he is referring not only to physical wounds but also to the deep psychological wounds or traumas inflicted by the violence and pain of wartime experiences. But veterans often struggle in secret, rather than work through their traumas collectively. How can we give voice to their narratives of trauma, which are often rendered invisible or ignored?

Notes

1. Bryan Doerries, The Theater of War: What Ancient Greek Tragedies Can Teach Us Today (New York: Knopf, 2015), 4.

2. Jonathan Shay, Achilles in Vietnam: Combat Trauma and the Undoing of Character (New York: Atheneum, 1994), xix.

Recommended Citation

Shaw, Carly (2025) "Why We Return: Repetition and Remembrance in Elliot: A Soldier's Fugue," Comparative Drama: Vol. 59: Iss. 1, Article 6.
Available at: https://scholarworks.wmich.edu/compdr/vol59/iss1/6