TambourineBy Nily Naiman Post-traumatic stress in adults and children can express itself in a variety of ways. One of these is withdrawal from social interaction, and one of the most effective means of withdrawal is self-imposed silence, or muteness. In such cases the traumatized individual, by becoming and remaining mute, creates a permanent safety bubble of sorts that allows necessary and unavoidable interactions with others to continue, while cutting off the threat of having to establish the degree of communication that might require having to relive or having to reveal to another person the pain, horror, or profound humiliation of the traumatic incident.
In the novel Tambourine, author Nily Naiman brings this syndrome to the world’s attention through her portrayal of a nine-year-old Gypsy girl, Gisele, who is raped by a Nazi soldier when a group of them raid her family’s encampment in war-time France. Gisele slowly recovers from the shock of the incident, and eventually communicates with the adults through sign language; but she holds on to the muteness as a safe retreat, a sure place where she will not have to speak of what she went through. Ultimately, it is the later brutal murder of her brother and others in her family by the Nazis that breaks her out of the bond of silence in which she has enveloped herself.
Individuals who have suffered from post-traumatic silence are invited to submit their testimonies and comments tonilynaiman@hotmail.comand to chipmunkapublishing.com to help the author bring the world to an awareness of this disease from which the author herself has suffered.
The book can be purchased at chipmunkapublishing.com, barnesandnoble.com, amazon.com, and other internet booksellers.
Post-traumatic stress in adults and children can express itself in a variety of ways. One of these is withdrawal from social interaction, and one of the most effective means of withdrawal is self-imposed silence, or muteness. In such cases the traumatized individual, by becoming and remaining mute, creates a permanent safety bubble of sorts that allows necessary and unavoidable interactions with others to continue, while cutting off the threat of having to establish the degree of communication that might require having to relive or having to reveal to another person the pain, horror, or profound humiliation of the traumatic incident.
In the novel Tambourine, author Nily Naiman brings this syndrome to the world’s attention through her portrayal of a nine-year-old Gypsy girl, Gisele, who is raped by a Nazi soldier when a group of them raid her family’s encampment in war-time France. Gisele slowly recovers from the shock of the incident, and eventually communicates with the adults through sign language; but she holds on to the muteness as a safe retreat, a sure place where she will not have to speak of what she went through. Ultimately, it is the later brutal murder of her brother and others in her family by the Nazis that breaks her out of the bond of silence in which she has enveloped herself.
Individuals who have suffered from post-traumatic silence are invited to submit their testimonies and comments tonilynaiman@hotmail.comand to chipmunkapublishing.com to help the author bring the world to an awareness of this disease from which the author herself has suffered.
The book can be purchased at chipmunkapublishing.com, barnesandnoble.com, amazon.com, and other internet booksellers.