Edwidge Danticat Death

A wanted criminal. In “The Book of the Dead” by Edwidge Danticat, that is what Annie’s father represents when looking exclusively at the facts. He is a former prison guard in Haiti under the Duvalier dictatorship that tortured prisoners and has a visible reminder of this in the form of a scar on his cheek. He tortured others, fled Haiti, and is now hiding his past in fear of punishment. By following orders that harmed humans and performing criminal acts he has become a wanted criminal eluding justice. Yet, as a character we do not feel animosity towards him, but we sympathize with him. Three parts of his identity as a prison guard play a role in this: his development into a torturer, PTSD, and hiding. These three parts are not only in

The torture he performed leads the father to feel ashamed of his actions, causing the nightmares throughout the story. These are symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder, a very large issue among prison guards. Studies have shown that “36 per cent of the men working as correction officers within federal penitentiaries report being affected by post-traumatic stress disorder” (Galloway). However, prison workers receive less attention than other occupations, such as soldiers, police, and firefighters, making it more difficult for them to receive the help that they require (Galloway). The guards stationed at Guantanamo Bay suffer greatly from PTSD. A documentary by VICE News interviewed two guards from Camp Seven, a top-secret detention center that holds fourteen high-value detainees, including four involved in the 9/11 attacks. Camp Seven is unknown to most and not mentioned to anyone not deployed there. This was the first time anyone spoke up about the post-traumatic stress disorder they suffered from coming out of Camp Seven. The documentary focused on one soldier that acted as a guard and one nurse stationed at Camp Seven. They both suffer from PTSD. The guard tells a story about how a prisoner broke his arm within his first two weeks stationed at the prison. The prisoner bit his arm and

A line near the beginning of the story states, “He was feeling too ugly” (Danticat 195). At this point in the story, we did not know the truth and therefore just assumed that he was ashamed of his scar. However, after finishing the story, we learn that it is not the scar that he is ashamed of, but what the scar represents. It represents all of the inhumane acts he performed on his prisoners. The last line of the story is very telling. It states, “Those who give the blows may try to forget, but those who carry the scars must remember” (Danticat 199). No matter how much he will want the nightmares to end, they will never cease to exist and he will never forget the torture he did to others, just as the soldier will never forget depriving another human of sleep and the Guantanamo guard will never forget the prisoner who broke his arm. While this may not be a happy message for The New Yorker readers to realize, it is a real one. Those who suffer from PTSD will never forget. However, it also sends the message that the soldiers, guards, police, and anyone who works at a potentially traumatic job may and do need the help of others. Although we may not think of prison guards or torturers as typical candidates for PTSD, this story helps open the readers’ minds to the fact that they need as much help as any other