폭력에 저항하기: 『처음에 심장이 사라졌을 때는 텅 빈 것 같았지만 이제 괜찮아요』와 『렐라와 동료들』에 재현된 스토리텔링의 정치학

Resisting Violence: The Politics of Storytelling in it felt empty when the heart went at first but it is alright now and Lela & Co.

This essay explores storytelling as a political drama strategy in two 21st-century plays that deal with sex trafficking, Lucy Kirkwood’s it felt empty when the heart went at first but it is alright now and Cordelia Lynn’s Lela & Co. Tapping into the recent tradition of women’s monologues that give voice to victims of sexual violence and exploitation, these dialogical monologues foreground and dramatize the female characters’ storytelling as violence survivors’ self-representation and reclaiming of subjectivity. In the process, the characters draw and reciprocate the spectatorial gaze, resisting the objectification of the female body. More significantly, their storytelling bears witness to their ordeal and in doing so engenders audience engagement. Kirkwood’s promenade stage invites the audience to follow Dijana’s journey alongside and reflect on their complicity in sexual exploitation, whereas the testimonial storytelling of Lynn’s narrator calls on the spectator to witness her story about violence against women in the global age.