Requiem for a Woman’s Soul

Never have I read a novel, which has made me shed tears of blood and made me shudder every time I tried to read it. Though containing only 100 pages, but this book made me utterly difficult to finish. I have to leave it unfinished many times due to the degree of violence portrayed by author. Anyway, finally I succeeded to finish this literary masterpiece written by Argentinian author and journalist Omar Rivabella.

Once I read a review on Conrad’s “Heart of Darkness” where the reviewer stated that she started contemplating suicide after finishing the said book. She was wrong in saying so about Conrad’s famous work. However, the statement can assertively be given about Rivabella’s literary fiction for this is the tale that will unfailingly make you feel how brutal is the world. It offers a psychological insight into violence individually as well as collectively.

One cannot authoritatively claim this account is based upon a true story but, simultaneously, it must be based upon true events. Because everyone knows it what happened in Argentine during dictatorial regime of Jorge Rafael Videla (1974-1983). Vidala ordered to conduct an infamous military operation known as “Operation Condor” through which political dissidents were abducted, tortured and murdered in various concentration camps. Since, Omar Rivabella is a journalist therefore he must have had enough interactions with survivors of those concentration camps. From there he got the idea of writing this novel.

The story is set in an unknown Argentinian village where brutalities, atrocities, torture and violence are inflicted upon ‘dissents of the state’ by making them disappear enforcedly. This novel encapsulates such incidents by portraying a main character of a literature student called Suzanne. Suzanne anyhow manages to write a diary in prison and smuggles it out to prison to a trustworthy Father Anotnio. Father Antonio tries his level best to serialise that uneven account of prison memoirs because the diary is written on small papers, matchbox, cigarette pocket, toilet papers and all other things, which were available to the inmate in the prison. Thus starts an emotional journey of a character enduring every type of violence in the prison.

Initially Father Antonio starts working on received jail diary reluctantly. Slowly and gradually, he manages to recall Suzanne. Then Antonio works tirelessly upon the diary without even taking care of his own health. Because, it seems, Father Antonio and Suzanne share the same suffering and bond of violence. During working on the diary, father Antonio himself falls ill due to the effects of violence he reads and feels.

Since I do not like to add spoilers in my review. Therefore, keeping in view my tradition, I will not write here much about the climax and the way of storytelling of the author. This is the story of trauma, recovery, grief, mourning, self-discovery, spirituality, symbolism. The novel symbolises Suzanne not an individual victim but a symbol of those all people who have remained victims of violence throughout the world.

Published first in 1986 in English, this novel became an instant best seller throughout the world. This novel does not tend to answer many questions regarding any brutal dictator society. Instead, it dares ask questions about it. It asks many questions regarding, attitude of torturers towards victim, behaviours of torturers toward society, the role of torturers in their own homes, and mainly the psychological state of victim.