"I think the Word is Dignity"

[Originally published here]

Today, I read My Name is Rachel Corrie. This short play, edited by Katharine Viner and Alan Rickman, is drawn from the diaries and emails of Rachel Corrie, an American killed in Palestine while nonviolently defending a civilian house from destruction by the Israeli military in 2003. The play was performed on London's West End and has seen some limited productions in America, though it has engendered controversy because of its frank attitude towards the reality of the ongoing violence being perpetrated against civilians in Israel's occupation of Palestine.

The work is deeply moving: a sad yet inspiring look at the life and death of a passionate child who became an equally passionate adult. The text of the play comes directly from Rachel's own journals and letters (with the exception of a few letters sent to her, and minimal stage directions). Her writing comprises sometimes prose, sometimes lists, sometimes poetry -- but whatever the form, it remains throughout poignant and compelling, drawing the reader into Rachel's world and into the development of her ideas and emotions. At the end, I felt not as though I had met a character on a stage, but had actually grown to know, in whatever small way, the person behind the words.

As Rachel lives among the Palestinian people, she is both surprised by, and admiring of, the way they deal with the horrific realities of their existence. In a letter to her mother, she writes:

I am amazed at their strength in defending such a large degree of their humanity against the incredible horror occurring in their lives and against the constant presence of death. I think the word is dignity.

A little later, she reflects on the possibility that more people will recognize and protest the true brokenness of the world, a fracturing of which the oppression of Palestine is symptomatic, but that extends far beyond the Middle East:

I look forward to seeing more and more people willing to resist the direction the world is moving in: a direction where our personal experiences are irrelevant, that we are defective, that our communities are not important, that we are powerless, that the future is determined, and that the highest level of humanity is expressed through what we choose to buy at the mall.

Rachel Corrie's tragic death served to stir up public opinion about the situation in Palestine. (Sadly, this discussion was quickly overshadowed in the media by the American invasion of Iraq.) In the ongoing debates about the true nature of the occupation and of the Palestinian resistance, Rachel's writings offer a valuable insight that is underappreciated in the mainstream discussion. The final pages of the play contain her reflections on the response of Palestinians to Israel's military activities, and here she presents the argument that, despite the fringe cases of terrorist activity by some groups, the vast majority of the population is continually countering the occupation through nonviolent methods in the truest sense. In a letter to her parents, she writes:

You asked about non-violent resistance, and I mentioned the first intifada. The vast majority of Palestinians right now, as far as I can tell, are engaging in Gandhian non-violent resistance. ... These people are being shot at every day and they continue to go about their business as best they can in the sights of machine guns and rocket launchers. Isn't that basically the epitome of non-violent resistance?

My Name is Rachel Corrie thus offers the reader (of, if you are lucky enough, the audience-member) three things: a poignant look at the life of an inspiring figure; an uplifting reflection on the capacity of the human spirit to deal with injustice -- the hope for a better future despite present pain; and an intriguing, if cursory, discussion of the role of nonviolence in the conflict. I give the work my highest recommendation to anyone interested in these issues -- but be prepared to be deeply moved and greatly inspired.