Analysis of Trauma and Testimony in the 1982 Film “Sophie’s Choice”

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Table of Contents

Introduction
Literature Review
Methodology
Analysis of Sophie Choice
Limitations of Sophie’s choice
Final remarks
Works Cited

Introduction

The American film industry has continuously taken the step of addressing the events of the holocaust in several of its productions. Baron estimates that “starting in 1980, over 20 films about the holocaust have been released to theaters or aired on television annually” (74). Hollywood, as the supreme cinematographic industry of the modern western world, has focused considerably on the topic of movies and profiting them. Various productions stand out in Hollywood approaching the themes of the holocaust from different contexts. Consequently, these productions endeavor to build on the imagery of this period of history, which up to today intrigues and influence the entire western civilization. The unquestionable dimension of that historical period allies itself into the ever-growing appropriation and theorization of the events of the holocaust and their validity. Given that, this paper will seek to analyze how Sophie’s choice, a holocaust-related Hollywood movie, an introspection of how it communicates with theories about the events, as well as how it diverges from, or endorses survivors theories that relate to testimony and trauma is vital for consideration. Holocaust entangled a period in history when, due to perceived beliefs of racial inferiority, the German Nazi regime mass killed Jews totaling to around six million. The regime also targeted races not related to Jews. Such groups included disabled, gypsies, Russians among others. About 200,000, gypsies, about 200,000 physically or mentally challenged patients from German race were also murdered. Additionally, “…other groups were prosecuted on political, ideological and behavioral grounds, among them communalists, socialist, Jehovah’s witness and homosexuals” (Dawidowicz 3). Many of the people belonging to holocaust target group, particularly the religious leaders and those whose behavior did not much some of the prescribed social norms principally died out of starvation, mistreatment and or neglect. The 1982 movie, Sophie’s choice by coordinator Alan J. Pakula, talks about a former concentration camp inmate who is going through the underlying process of overcoming the trauma. Sophie, the main character, is cinematic representation of the most influential source of assessment of the horrors of world war two holocausts, the survivor. In the life of a survivor like Sophie, besides the issue of testimony, there is inherent question of trauma- as defined by psychologists and discussed by Denmark La Capra, which besides generating consequent immeasurable damaging effects on the lives of the victims, strongly influences their capacity to testify (32). Consequently this paper also has the objective of conducting an analysis of Sophie’s testimony as compared to those of real survivors as well as how trauma manifests in Sophie’s life. The context of the analysis of the usage of the image of survivor represents the mainstream cinematographic industry: Hollywood. Hollywood is cinema is the most popular and, therefore, the most viewed since before the events of the war and holds considerable influences on the audiences of the whole world. Based on Giorgio Agamben and Premio Levies theories about testimony and witness, the paper aims at providing explanations about what and who the witness of the holocaust is; and how Sophie agrees or disagrees with those definitions. Guided by Dominick, La Capra’s terms, and theories about trauma borrowed from psychoanalysis, the paper also extends into introspecting who the traumatized survivor is how trauma affects his or her life. If Sophie is a verisimilar representation of a camp survivor, how trauma manifest itself in her, as well as how the notion of trauma influences the construction of the fictional character stand out as fundamental questions that the paper seeks to answer. The paper also analyses other inner questions regarding different moments of trauma memory and events particularly to the life of the character in order to create a solid basis to response of the proposed questions. In addition, the theories of trauma and those of testimony will be interrelated in an attempt to explain how one influences the other.

Furthermore, the author analyzes how the element of mise-en-scene such as setting lighting costumes and behavior of the figures, as defined by Bordwell and Thomson (169), served to construct the imaginary of trauma in Sophie’s life. In different sequences of the movie, these elements become powerful tools to support the characteristics of persona and consequently the image of the victim with devastating story tell. There is more besides the necessary discussion about the one considered the biggest man-caused tragedy in the history of the western civilization. These include, and limited to, lessons and the truths it taught and revealed to mankind, as well as other facts that support this research such as the importance of the cinematic approach to history. Despite the hefty criticism for the categorical historians who harshly accuse the role of cinema in the constructing of the historical past, according to Radstone, cinema has functioned as complete source of historical and political information to the great public (16). However, the question of whether cinema serves as true representation of reality remains largely eminent for consideration. Hence, there is no warranty for its negation.

Literature Review

After the addition of the two events, holocaust and Second World War, to the history of humankind as to constitute two foremost human-caused events that resulted to immense loss of human population, the theoretical perspective of trauma and testimony acquired ardent scholarly attention. The book Testimony: Crisis of Witnessing in Literature, Psychoanalysis and History by Felman and Laub digs into the existing relationship between pedagogy and trauma. They explore from the contexts of literally and clinical considerations, the manner in which one can deploy testimony process- “bearing witness to crisis or trauma” (Felman and Laub 1) in the classroom setting or rather “how testimony can teach us” (Felman and Laub 1). With the help of accounts of autobiographies, literature and videos of holocaust coupled with other war survivors, they advocate for “pedagogical and clinical lessons on listening to human suffering and traumatic narratives” (Felman and Laub 10). In their work, Feldman and Laub establish links that may be subtle for joining harmoniously the concepts of testifying, witnessing, memory, history, writing and survival. In the process, they give an insight for possibilities of existence of a way of librating victims of trauma from traumatic experiences and at the same time retain such memories for the purposes of future generations to learn from them.

Scholars widely agree on the fact that prolonged and intensive exposure to negative emotional experiences has the capacity to leave people with permanent and perhaps irrespirable physical and mental damage. Even mature people have possibilities of experiencing trauma. This notion perhaps came into consideration after Second World War that followed the advents of holocaust. Withuis, and Mooij reckon that “the term trauma may be common in large parts of the world at the start of the 21st century…however, it was usual when world war II drew close (323). On the other hand, Croisy claims, “where in most western countries trauma is now automatically associated with a psychological injury, at that time trauma referred simply to a physical injury” (87). The change in the meaning of the term trauma indicates how people have emerged to alter the way they appreciate the severity of the adversity in their health and more often how they scrutinize both themselves and their neighbors as victims of psychological turmoil.

Trauma impairs people’s perceptions about their humanity. Holocaust entangled one of the worst negative encounters that Jews exposed themselves to with the capacity to erode their humanity. For the few who retained their humanity, arguably their desire to go on with their normal life squarely rested on having an opportunity to testify what they underwent. Since some survived, they needed an opportunity to speak, and hence testify. According to Agamben, there are two witnesses: “‘The Muselmann is the complete witness.’ It implies two contradictory propositions: the Muselmann is the non-human, the one who could never bear witness,’ and ‘the one who cannot bear witness is the true witness, the absolute witness’” (Agamben 150). In this context, the truest witness is the one who cannot express himself or herself, since any expression of testimony in words suffers from some alterations and or modification of what actually happened. Congruent with this argument Agamben posits that “whoever assumes the charge of bearing witness to their name knows that he or she must bear witness in the name of the impossibility of bearing witness” (Agamben 34). Arguably, language forms a dominant way of expression and fostering human interactions. Given that Auschwitz remnants had slim opportunities to express themselves, perhaps going by this argument, they could rarely call themselves complete human beings. This perception is what rendered them traumatized. Inferring from Lawrence Langer argument that there exists a “rift that separates words from the events they seek to animate” (Langer 26), all people writing about the aftermaths of holocaust testimonies have a particular drawback since the most significant indicators of experiences that would end up traumatizing the survivors goes unsaid. Therefore, as Gordon posits, “rather than handing to its audience a complete rendition, testimony presents itself as the mouth of a cave, indicating the presence of darker depths accessible only through it” (Para.12). It, thus, intrigues whether filming the experiences of the survivors or even poetically narrating the encounters during the warring times satisfactorily presents actual record of the events that took place.

The manner in which the messages in the cinema are portrayed is much dependent on the manner in which the cinema is organized. People will sympathize with characters who seem so afflicted by certain moral wrongs perhaps tantamount to what Sophie had to go through. In the classical Hollywood cinema: film style and mode of production to 1960, Bordwell and Thomson argue, classical cinemas are “integral, coherent system and a system that interrelates a certain mode of production based on fordist principles of industrial organization. They were a set of interdependent stylistic norms elaborated by 1917 that remained more or less in place until about 1960” (78). The core notion behind classical style of films lies predominantly on neo-formalist poetics coupled with perceptions of cognitive psychology. However, most scholars believe that this overlaps with padigrims set out in the film theories of the 1970s. A chief diversion is about “principles of narrative dominance, linear and unobtrusive narration centering on the psychology and agency of individual characters and continuity editing” (Bordwell and Thomson 29). Filmmakers have a noble role to guide the audience in interpretation of films. This is perhaps vital since the way films are guided helps in creating additional audience-film attachment. Somewhat congruent with this argument Bordwell and Thomson stress that interpretation of films can be enhanced “ through motivation and coherence of causality, space, and time; clarity and redundancy in guiding the viewers mental operations; formal patterns of repetitions and variations, rhyming, balance and symmetry; and overall compositional unity and closure” (57). Filmmakers have scrupulous norms that they follow in the direction and design of their movies. With regard to films theories put forward by Bordwell and Thomson, “the principles, which Hollywood claims as its own rely on notions of decorum, proportion, formal harmony, respect for tradition, mimesis, self-effacing craftsmanship and sophisticated control of the perceiver’s response canons, which critics in any medium usually call classical” (3). Bordwell and Thomson book goes to the extent of providing an explanation of how Hollywood cinema conducts its work. In this context, Hollywood cinema dominance stands out to persist by virtue of its worldwide popularity. By noting the fact that Sophie’s choice is a production of the Hollywood, its capacity to have global attention, as a narration that accounts for holocaust experiences, is subtle for consideration.

Testimony, especially in historic events that the testifier is believed not to be at a position to recount all the events that happened, expose the witness listeners to a myriad of questions about the authenticity of the testimonies. In Testimony, Felman and Laub explore experiences of showing a witness testimony in a hall dominated by historians. The holocaust survivor claimed to have seen the Auschwitz four chimneys explode all over sudden. The historians rejected this testimony since, in the historical context; there was only one chimney in Auschwitz that exploded. Perhaps this laid some subtle foundation about the theoretical consideration of testimonies. According to Laub, “since the memory of the testifying woman turned out to be, in this way, fallible, one could not accept – nor give credence to – her whole account of the events” (Felman and Laub 59). It sounds absurd to reject the witness of a survivor; having priory established beyond no doubt that the testifier was actually a true holocaust remnant. However, history need conform to the facts for justification of the testimony as a true account of such events that had impeccable traumatizing effects to its survivors.

Some holocaust theories speak of relative truth. Lippstadt contends with this premise and adds that there exist two accounts in which one is terribly wrong. He, further, asserts, “Holocaust denial is a part of this phenomenon” (19). Levi, on the other hand, claims that among many prisoners there recurs a common nightmare in which “they had returned home and with passion and relief were describing their past sufferings, addressing themselves to a loved person, and were not believed, indeed were not even listened to” (121). Crucial to pin point is that, an incredible difference exists between deconstruction and disbelief. As Gordon puts it, “…deconstruction widens the opening for disbelief because it emphasizes the constructedness and malleability of history” (Para. 5). Rejection of survivor witness on accounts of historical non-agreements, thus, seems like the denial of the victim’s right: having his views heard.

Methodology

In the analysis of Sophie’s choice, the focus is to unveil the evidence of trauma in the main character: Sophie. The methodology that is deployment entails consideration of the manner the movie is made-mis en scene –and then relating the direction and narratives given as to whether they are indicative of traumatized main character: Sophie. Consequently, perhaps it is necessary to give a review of the movie coupled with identification of particular circumstances in the new life of Sophie that may give hints on the evidence of exposing herself to traumatizing conditions prior to her current liberated situation.

In an attempt to establish the historical account of the holocaust as filmed by Hollywood’s movie, Sophie’s Choice, Hartman remarks that “malleability of history and function of testimony in the construction of history gives rationale to the pathological fear of forgetting evoked by most survivors” (10) are imperative for consideration. The genuineness of the narrations as a true representation of the holocaust horror as narrated and depicted through Sophie will be looked at in an endeavor to unveil as to whether it posses gaps between the actual historical documentation of the holocaust and events in the tales in the movie. This way, the value of the witness who can express herself, as well as the capacity to give a precise account of experiences at the concentration camp will perhaps come out. In this way, the paper will check out the holocaust theories, trauma theories, as well as testimony theories evident in the Sophie’s Choice.

Analysis of Sophie Choice

Sophie, the core character in Sophie’s choice, is one of the survivors of the holocaust. The encounters and experiences at the killings centers have obsessed her. Despite the desperation that she went through at the concentration camps established during the Nazi regime, Nathan gives her some reasons to continue living. As she recounts her experience, her composition critically reveals the horror that she encounters. Nathan and Sophie’s establish friendship with the narrator of the movie: Stingo. Despite being enormously happy with Nathan, their relationship is widely endangered by the concentration camp experience, which act as ghosts and risky obsessions to her future life.

As Sophie recounts the experiences at the concentration camps, her mental state of mind, mainly portrayed by the manner she speaks out her concerns reveals a traumatized holocaust survivor. According to trauma theories, even adults who have had long and persistent exposure to extremely negative things have the capacity to develop mental states of desperation that afflicts their live to the extent that the majority of them lose the sense of life (Croisy 86). Sophie is in this condition. She cannot live without flashbacking her life at the concentration camp. The flash backs reveals to the audience the intricate details that helped to construct the current Sophie’s character as she narrates the story. Majority of her desperate secrets is revealed which she had chosen to remain secretive especially the gut wrenching decisions that she was commanded to make.

It is perhaps widely acceptable among many people that death is part of life. People cannot live without situations losing their loved ones. In fact, there exists no history without death. As Croisy laments, “ death is symbolic in the sense that it is present theory in every event, every sequence of history, every moment of living, every trace of live and every movement we make as individuals or groups” (105). However, on the other hand, the human-caused death in the very eyes of one’s relatives exposes those left behind with immense trauma, especially upon contemplating the circumstances that lead to the demise. In fact, as Sophie flashbacks the horror of delivering her girl child for death in exchange with her son exposes a traumatized character who hardly accepts her experience. Freud posits, “Death is a drive, through which desires are expressed…this death appears as a symptom of an individual’s autonomy” (Croisy 109). Arguably, perhaps Freud argument about death could be widely true when this death results from natural causes. For natural death, people accept its occurrence and are able to endure its aftermaths characterized by agony. Nevertheless, one may wish to know the case about human-caused death. Can Sophie possibly accept death as real, as well as a way of marking the transition from one state to another? Can she just dismiss the killing of her natives by the Germans as way creating history? Sophie, therefore, must be experiencing trauma, as she seeks answers on the circumstances that led to ethic cleansing of her people.

The Second World War and other events that took place prior to this time such holocaust are encounters that had immense traumatizing effects on people’s life such as Sophie. Trauma arises from situations that disrupt the state of people’s security. Throughout the testimonies that Sophie gives to both Nathan and Stigo, there stands a clear revelation of the extent of violation of Sophie’s state of security. Violation of security on her part was not only in the contexts of violation of her rights such as movement but also on discourses of uncertainty of the being alive the following day. This was perhaps evidenced by the fact that no one in the concentration camps was pretty sure whether he or she would be next to be transported by rail to the gassing chamber. Traumatized people perceive the world as a dangerous to dwell. Sophie, through flashbacks of her experience at the concentration camps, not only viewed the world as a place that is dangerous to live in, but also as a sphere that cannot support the interests of the prejudiced people on the accounts of humanely constructed inferiority of one race. Arguably, in this context, Sophie’s state of trauma arises from two encounters: killings of people belonging to her race and the perception inculcated in her that she was of a less significant race.

Referring to mis-en-scene, as curtains retreat, a character that is full of blurred mind comes up. From the way she talks, a memorization of her past life exposes an immense state of disbelief, denial, anger, hopelessness irritability and swing of moods. Facial looks changes from glittering to one characterized with despairs as she memorized her experiences in the concentration camps. In this sense, her traumatic condition seems well constructed by the moviemaker. As Seeburger posits, when one undergoes state of psychological trauma, “even when you are feeling better, painful memories or emotions may trouble you from time to time—especially in response to triggers such as an anniversary of the event or an image, sound, or situation that reminds you of the traumatic experience” (Para.12). Reminiscence of life at the concentration camps, well seems to take Sophie back to the advents of the holocaust and could fairly see herself inside the camp waiting for the norm: uncertainties of being alive the following day. On the other hand, the audiences largely have mental construction of vivid images of life experiences at the concentration camp. The audiences consequently get so ingrained in sharing Sophie’s experiences that, they get into her shoes and tend to see themselves in the concentration camps throughout the 150 minutes movie watch: Only after the movie is over that one can come into terms with the Sophie’s feelings.

In the movie, Nathan happens to be a Jew who saved Sophie from Auschwitz. Even though the violence perpetrated by Nathan characterizes their relationship with Sophie, especially when drunk, Sophie seems not to care about it. What seems to obsess her is the concentration camp experience. It is not such minor life experiences. She does not see Nathan as the likely cause of a problematic relationship but rather as a source her life. As the perpetrators of inhumane acts haunt Sophie at the concentration camp that she sees as ghosts, they are a plague to Nathan. Sophie’s father was one of the people who had loudest voices against Jews. His interactions with the Nazi administrators made Sophie’s have an opportunity to make a choice of which child she wanted dead, as well as the one to save. Apart from the main character, Sophie, Nathan experiences trauma from the Auschwitz experiences the movie presents him as a drunkard and one afflicted by bipolar disorder that causes his random mood swings.

Sophie stands out as a person who has adopted cute trauma coping mechanisms since at the inception of the movie, the audience has no hit of likelihood of Sophie having being in the Auschwitz. This is perhaps because the movie does not immediately start to give Sophie’s state of unhappy and traumatizing life. The audience is tempted to look at Sophie as a woman who is just a sweet lover to Nathan. However as the story progresses, elements of her unhappy life begin to unfold before the events that brought her to her current state are introspected. One scenario that makes the audience share bitterly the Sophie’s experience is the flashback of her father’s life. Through this flashback, it is becomes ardently clear that Sophie’s father, despite being a polish, was anti-Semite. He delivered the speech believed to have led to holocaust: the speech on Jews problem in Poland. He additionally agreed with decision on the final solution that entailed extermination of Jews. Sarcastically, the Nazi regime also eliminated her father while Sophie ended up at the concentration camp. It is at the camp that she was compelled to take her daughter for execution in exchange with her son. This difficult choice impeccably haunts her. To make it even worse, she is uncertain about her boy’s life in the future something that makes her souls immensely stained with the consequences of her state of desperation getting even more pronounced.

The events that unfold in the life of Sophie, even after the dawn of her liberation at the concentration camp gives outright indication of trauma on her part. Sophie cannot walk out from the person who liberated her despite his uncouth behavior. Apart from being an alcohol addict, Nathan is tragic. His inebriations renders him paranoiac coupled with being violent. Arguably, due to long constructed poor self-perception rooted from her experience in the holocaust, Sophie forgives him. A recount of the current life of Sophie’s and the past life that she has gone through gives the movie and intense breadth and depth. Sophie’s encounters end up being contagious in the sense that it is impossible for one to watch the movie and yet not get intrigued with contradictions and the complexity, of life that the main character experiences.

In light of the character of Sophie, it raises questions among many trauma and testimony scholars as to whether the imminent trauma and the testimonies of the holocaust that the Hollywood character: Sophie, give is depictive of what actually transpired during the holocaust. As argued by many, a truly traumatic incidence has the capacity to make people bewildered and shattered. Again the witness given by Sophie’s testimonies of her encounters in the holocaust remains questionable as whether they are true historical presentation of the traumas that victims of holocaust went through: whether dead or alive. While reflecting on Felman and Laub work, Frank Seeburger, a professor of philosophy at University of Denver, writes, “…testimony, bore witness–testified–at all to the Holocaust, but merely used it–no less than the worst Hollywood usage for profit’s sake–for exterior purposes, and thus repeated the silencing of the Holocaust testimony that they purported to honor” (Para 10). One concern here is that, Hollywood being a profits making organization has the capacity to engineer the movie to reflect on what would immensely influence their audience. Secondly, one cannot represent the events of holocaust perhaps poetically or accurately by a movie. He/she cannot duplicate the scenes in any form of theatre acts, not even literal language. Accessing the magnitude of mental torture prevalent in survivors of the holocaust may seem impossible to portray in the Sophie’s choice.

The holocaust narratives that are available including Sophie’s choice reflect on the historical and clinical perspective of testimony. As Seeburger reckons, “While historical evidence to the event which constitutes the trauma may be abundant and documents in vast supply, the trauma–as a known event and not simply as an overwhelming shock–has not been truly witnessed yet, not been taken cognizance of” (Para.3). Putting Sophie’s choice into this perspective, the coming to birth of the narration entails a process of developing cognizance of the trauma that afflicted the holocaust survivors. In this dimension, consequently the testimony of the holocaust trauma also includes the audience who responds to the screen on which the events that took place in the holocaust are for inscription for the sheer first time. Nevertheless, how acculturate is this inscription?

Screen memories not only veil the information that the audience should remember, but, in addition, constitute the surface for projection of the memory itself. Felman and Laub object the screen presentation of trauma encountered by holocaust survivors claiming that “it is extremely concealing depictive of an example of a woman recounting her experience of the rebellion at Auschwitz” (60). The testimony offered by Sophie is widely rejected since many historians argue that it is historically inaccurate. In a prior testimony given by a woman who claimed to have been a survivor of the holocaust, the woman recalled four chimneys being brown up while, in the real sense, only one crematorium chimney was. Consequently, the woman’s testimony ends being largely incongruent to historical theory of testimony, which demands non-existence of gaps between the memories and the facts. The representation of traumatic events in films or any other literally work, perhaps follows closely to this kind of witness. What actually historians drive at is that a movie like Sophie’s choice serves as just a filmic memoirs but not a reflection of circumstances that transpired at the concentration camps since Sophie’s memories may not correspond to historical reality.

Limitations of Sophie’s choice

Perhaps one of the major limitations of the movie: Sophie’s choice is the question of its credibility in providing accurate presentation of the traumatic exposures that the survivors of the holocaust underwent in the concentration camps. The Agamben proposition that the most accurate witness is the inexpressible witness amplifies this constraint since one can trace the trauma associated with negative encounters such as holocaust from the event itself. Consequently, the filmic presentation of trauma suffers inaccuracies. In fact, the “authority of testimony depends not on a factual truth, a conformity between something said and a fact or between memory and what happened, but rather on the immemorial relation between the unsayable and the sayable, between the outside and the inside of language” (Agamben 158). The Hollywood movie Sophie’s choice, is arguably a historical account of holocaust, filmed directed and acted by people who were apart from not being members of the targeted races by the final solution presents perhaps mildly what transpired. This is largely so since the truest account of the experiences is only available in the event itself.

Felman and Laub see trauma as to encompass an event that has no witness. However, in the Sophie’s choice, Sophie is not only a traumatized character: she acts as the witness narrating the experiences at the concentration camp. Sophie hence has the ability to know that she underwent or rather her past was dark. With regard to trauma theories, such a condition is largely rare since, extraordinarily few people with psychological problems have awareness of their situation.

Final remarks

After the toppling of the Nazi regime, the larger Europe nations had to come to terms with the evident immense losses left behind. Large masses of people died and enormous resources misused in mass killing and deportation of human beings of Jewish origin. As Dawidowicz posits, “Millions of people had lost their lives…more millions had to live on without their loved ones; many were to suffer uncertainty about the fate of their nearest and dearest for a long time” (79). People watched in full glare as the Nazi gassed the Jewish people to death, overworking others to death and, further, executing them by shooting them. Worse still, people died in groups of ten. It was thus an intense mental torture to observe helplessly waiting for one’s turn to get in to the gassing chamber, or the next bullet to penetrate ones flesh.

Even after the mass killing of the non-German people came to an end, the liberation of people was accompanied by sadness and grief as the remnants such as Sophie reminiscence their experiences in the holocaust. People not only suffered from illness but also “starved and haunted by their own experiences in camps and in hiding, during combat and bombardments” (Baron 61). People had to resume life after leaving the concentration camps. However, one question remained. This question concerns itself with the anticipated effect on their health, as well as how the future was to reflect their experiences. As Baron confirms, in the modern days, “Survivors and soldiers, widows and witnesses, and persecuted and perpetrators, would stand out as victims who…might not develop a chronic invalidating mental disorder” (87). This will be possible based on a regular medical attention accorded to them. Situations such as avoidance of reminiscence of the killing experience encounters, intrusive flashbacks and hyperousal physical states would characterize Trauma in testimonies. However, Sophie does flashback without an indication in the movie of her endeavors to avoid such flash backs.

Sophie’s choice revolves around the theme of war and trauma. Many nations including the US have developed keen interests in the trauma arising from the aftermaths of the war: something largely borrowed from the German experience in the holocaust. Radstone posits, “The American medical profession became involved in European thinking on medical and psychological consequences of war through the reparation payments to Nazi victims who had moved to the US” (17). In Germany, on the other hand, people who had predominantly fled to the United States in fear of war conducted various medical examinations on possibilities of trauma amongst the survivors of the war. In this context, the knowledge of trauma likely to afflict people following exposure to negative experiences led to the strengthening of the “conviction of the international organizations of resistance, political prisoners, and prisoners of war that the war, and especially imprisonment in concentration camps, had caused permanent psychological damage” (Radstone 27). Holocaust has formed a crucial point of reference to the exemplification of the worst extent to which the violation of human rights can occur with preconceptions of bringing sanity in the human race.

Holocaust forms an example of a situation indicative of the need to take care of the likelihood of genocide occurrence, mass killing and or ethnic cleansing: something that nations should never allow to happen ever again. Additionally, holocaust has served to reinforce the existing knowledge on trauma and testimony globally. This is perhaps also widely attributable to the global impacts made by Sophie’s choice: a Hollywood production. As Withuis and Mooij note, Sophie’s choice has resulted to “enormous influence on the worldwide recognition of the Holocaust as a unique crime is a poignant illustration of this process” (331). Even though it is critically acceptable that experiences encountered at the concentration camps and the killing centers are not possible to record in a movie within 150 minutes, Sophie’s choice perhaps gives a glimpse of an example of some extremity in violation of the right of life among people based on racial prejudices. Otherwise, a fanatic of Sophie’s choice will declare it an informative piece of work, heavy-laden with traumatic episodes and crucial lessons, not only for then people, but also for generations to come.

Works Cited

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Levi, Primo. The Drowned and the Saved (transl. Raymond Rosenthal) in The Holocaust and the Limits of Representation, Sidra DeKoven Ezrahi. Jerusalem: Akademon, 1994. Print.

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Radstone, Susannah. Trauma theory: contexts, politics and ethics. Paragraph 30.1(2009): 9-29.

Seeburger, Frank. Trauma and philosophy: witnessing trauma; reflections on the work of Shoshanna Felman and Dori Laub, 2008. Web.

Withuis, Jolande, and Annet Mooij. The politics of war trauma: aftermath of World War II in eleven European countries. Studies of Netherlands Institute for War Documentation 4.6 (2010):323-335.

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