Deconstructing Suffering: A Critical Exploration of ‘The Discomfort of Evening’ by Marieke Lucas Rijneveld
Author : Adaa Dev
Abstract :
This paper critically explores The Discomfort of Evening by Marieke Lucas Rijneveld with focus on the multifaceted nature of suffering through the lens of Pain and Trauma theories. Focusing on the experiences of Jas, a ten year old girl, coping with the sudden death of her brother, the study focuses on the fragmentation of grief within a rural Christian family. Through the Cartesian Dualistic Theory and Gate Control Theory, the paper interrogates the complex psychological and behavioural responses to loss depicted in the novel. The findings in the novel point out that suffering is not a singular event, rather an ongoing fracture that dismantles identity, relationships and faith. Further, the study reveals how mental illness, loneliness and sin-consciousness intersect with childhood imagination expanding trauma from a private affliction to a collective family affliction. Ultimately, the novel highlights the duality of trauma- on one hand it fragments and disrupts lives, on the other it offers an opportunity for empathy, self-reflection and post-traumatic growth.
Keywords :
Trauma, suffering, pain, depression, mental illness.
