Tracing the Role of the Empathetic Imagination in Trauma Recovery Using International Picture Books

In J. Roger Kurtz’s 2013 piece on the African moral imagination [1], he calls for a more cross-cultural understanding of trauma within the field of literary trauma theory. Specifically, he asks, “how appropriate is trauma theory to non-Western traditions? Are the approaches and assumptions that have coalesced into a tentative ‘trauma canon’ applicable across cultures and through time” (423)? In sum, the answer is that it isn’t appropriate or applicable. According to Stef Craps and Gert Buelen:

trauma studies’ stated commitment to the promotion of cross-cultural ethical engagement is not borne out by the founding texts of the field (including Caruth’s own work), which are almost exclusively concerned with traumatic experiences of white Westerners and solely employ critical methodologies emanating from a Euro-American context (2).

This is where I believe international children’s literature can open doors for reading trauma recovery in multiple cultural contexts--by highlighting the manifestation of literary survivors’ imaginations in their recovery. I look to children’s and young adult fiction from non-Western cultures to demonstrate the underpinning role of the imagination because of its particular interest in the development and transformation of the mind. Trauma, in its multifaceted nature, is woven into the fabric of children’s literature, often serving as the catalyst for the narrative. In fact, traumatic events often occur simply to force the protagonist into facing their adventure without the guidance and/or assistance of an adult. The adventures don’t just start with traumatic events, but, as Eric Tribunella points out in his book Melancholia and Maturation, often center around the traumatic as a bridge to adulthood and maturity for the protagonist (xi). With trauma so centered in children’s and young adult literature in Euro-American experience, I was curious about texts set outside the Euro-American experience.

By tracing the empathetic imagination, we can read trauma recoveries that go beyond the limitations of current Western-centric trauma theory which are fraught by scientific debate. There is reason to believe that the imagination as a reading lens is flexible enough to transcend cultural differences. Kurtz’s exploration of the African moral imagination as demonstrative of psychiatrist, Dr. Judith Herman’s second phase of recovery [2] gives hope for such cross-cultural readings. In my research, the imagination of these fictional survivors, when combined with empathy, fuels their recovery from trauma.

Reading the Empathetic Imagination

I briefly demonstrate what reading the empathetic imagination can look like in the context of trauma recovery, turning my focus to the picturebook Good Night, Commander by Ahmed Akbarpour and Morteza Zahedi, initially published in Farsi in 2005 and translated to English in 2010.

The story is set in Iran after a boy loses his leg and his mother in a bombing. His father is now remarrying and the boy is playing war in his room. According to Dr. Herman, there are three phases to trauma recovery. Each of these phases can be found in Akbarpour and Zahedi’s story. I will exemplify the first two phases in brief and provide a more detailed analysis of the third phase below. The first phase is the establishment of safety, which the commander gains in two ways: 1) by wearing his prosthetic leg rather than using his crutch as he’s supposed to, and 2) by imagining himself as the commander in the game he is playing (4-5). The second phase is remembrance and mourning, which the young commander does when he recounts his experience of the bombing through an imaginary conversation with his mother’s picture, saying “Right, mom? ... Remember?” (5).

The third phase of recovery – and the one I suggest is of greatest concern in this book – is reconnection with society. The story is set on the night that his father and family prepare to meet the commander’s new mother (8). The commander starts out avoiding his family, eager to remain in his room, playing his game, but as the game progresses, the imagined enemy approaches, only for the commander to discover that the enemy is also a boy who has lost a leg and a mother (10-11). The two immediately call for a cease fire (12). Through playing his game, the boy is able to imagine empathizing with and befriending his own self. Once filled with shame over his lost leg and his inability to avenge his mother, he bonds over the shared experience with the imagined boy – even taking off his prosthetic and sharing it with him (11).

After this, we read a change in the commander. He is no longer filled with a need for revenge or shame over his lost leg. He has a new sense of peace in his situation, as seen in the final illustration of the boy, tucked in bed, looking over to the picture of his mother. In this final scene, the boy is situated left and upward of center, which according to Moebius’s picturebook codes, indicates a sense of security and even an elated state of being (17). Unlike the many drawings of the Commander throughout the text that show him small and at odd angles, here, the boy is sturdy in his bed and at a regular size. He is ready for his future with his growing family. By focusing on reading the traces of the commander’s imaginative empathy (as seen in his play), we are able to better interpret his recovery and healing throughout the text.

What’s Next

Imagination is a common element in therapeutic practice. Why, then, aren’t we prioritizing it in our literary readings? According to Vicky Sinclair, MBACP, “Imagination in psychotherapy is extremely beneficial to most clients and offers a great variety of tools and in different ways can apply to all approaches and conditions.” Tracing the imagination in literary survivors allows us to meet each text on its own footing, rather than the presuppositions of Western expectations. If we prioritize bringing the imagination of these characters to the forefront of our analysis and interpretation, the ability to open doors to previously closed conversations swings wide and representations of recovery that were previously unexplored can come into the spotlight.

Notes [1] Drawing on the term Moral Imagination as initially penned by Edmund Burke and then re-envisioned by Toni Morrison to mean “as the capacity for envisioning a new mode of existence following serious social harm,” Kurtz asserts that African literary history asserts a unique Moral Imagination due in part to its traumotogenic origins and rich cultural spiritual and communal practices.

[2] Herman, an American Psychiatrist renowned for her early work in the field, defines the second phase of recovery as when the survivor remembers and mourns what has happened to them.

Works Cited

Akbarpour, Ahmed. Good Night, Commander. Illustrated by Morteza Zahedi, Translated by Shadi Eskandani and Helen Mixer, Groundwood Books, 2010.

Craps, Stef, and Gert Buelens. “Introduction: Postcolonial Trauma Novels.” Studies in the Novel, vol 40, 2008, pp. 1–12. doi:10.1353/sdn.0.0008.

Kurtz, J. Roger. “Literature, trauma and the African moral imagination.” Journal of Contemporary African Studies, vol. 32, no. 4, 2014, pp. 421-35, DOI:10.1080/02589001.2014.979607.

Moebius, William. “Introduction to Picturebook Codes.” Word & Image, vol. 2, no. 2, April-June 1986, pp. 141-158.

Sinclair, Vicky. “The Use of Imagination in Psychotherapy.” Counseling Directory, 12 July 2013, https://www.counselling-directory.org.uk/memberarticles/the-use-of-imagination-in-psychotherapy, Accessed April 2020.

Tribunella, Eric L. Melancholia and Maturation: The Use of Trauma in American Children's Literature. Tennessee UP, 2010.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Mikayla Sharpless completed her M.A. from the Department of English at Kansas State University in the Spring of 2020. Her research interests fall under the larger field of children’s and young adult literature and extend into the medical humanities as she studies representations of trauma recovery and the role of the imagination. Outside of her research pursuits, she enjoys watching baking shows and playing chase with her nieces in her free time. Twitter: @mikaylarstweets