Beyond trauma writing: testimony and sublimation in the poetry of political prisoner

Abstract

The incarceration of militants and opponents of the military dictatorship was one of the most nefarious aspects of the regime that lasted from 1964 to 1985. The cruelty of the instruments and techniques of torture, which systematically kept the victims on the brink of death – their own and that of their companions and family members – resulted in intense psychic violence, as can be seen in various records, such as testimonials, reports, letters, etc. In addition to traditional narrative forms, those arrested by military bodies also produced a significant number of poems, both during the period of confinement, written and preserved clandestinely, and in post-prison freedom. Understanding poetic production as a drive re-addressing the psychic economy, especially in a context of surviving serious violations of basic human rights, the purpose of this work is to revisit the theme of sublimation, discussed in comparison with the contributions of Sigmund Freud and Jacques Lacan on the theme, in the reading of poems produced by political prisoners during the Brazilian military dictatorship, based on the work of poets such as Alex Polari, Aybirê Ferreira de Sá, Gilney Viana, Lara de Lemos and Pedro Tierra. The theoretical foundation will be anchored mainly in the postulates of psychoanalysis, with support in Birman, Freud and Lacan, and in the theory of testimonial literature, in dialogue with Seligmann-Silva.