As a member of Salvador Allende’s Personal Guards (GAP), Luz Arce worked with leaders of the Socialist Party during the Popular Unity Government from 1971 to1973. In the months following the coup, Arce served as a militant with others from the Left who opposed the military junta led by Augusto Pinochet, which controlled the country from 1973 to1990. Along with thousands of others in Chile, Arce was detained and tortured by Chile’s military intelligence service, the DINA, in their attempt to eliminate alternative voices and ideologies in the country. Arce’s testimonial offers the harrowing story of the abuse she suffered and witnessed as a survivor of detention camps, such as the infamous Villa Grimaldi.
But when faced with threats made to her family, including her young son, and with the possibility that she could be murdered as thousands of others had been, Arce began to collaborate with the Chilean military in their repression of national resistance groups and outlawed political parties. Her testimonial thus also offers a unique perspective from within the repressive structures as she tells of her work as a DINA agent whose identifications even lead to the capture of some of her former friends and compañeros.
During Chile’s return to democracy in the early 1990s, Arce experienced two fundamental changes in her life that led to the writing of her story. The first was a deep spiritual renewal through her contacts with the Catholic Church whose Vicariate of Solidarity had fought for human rights in the country during the dictatorship. The second was her decision to participate within the legal system to identify and bring to justice those members of the military who were responsible for the crimes committed from 1973 to1990. Luz Arce’s book invites readers to rethink the definition of testimonial narrative in Latin America through the unique perspective of a survivor-witness-confessor.
| |||||||||||||||
Book Description
Frequently Bought Together
Editorial Reviews
Review
"Powerful reading. . . . A devastating book . . . [which] itself became part of an important controversy within Chile at the time of its appearance, about whether former leftists and secret police collaborators should be welcomed or rejected in society, and by whom."—Steve Stern, author of Peru’s Indian Peoples and the Challenge of Spanish Conquest
"The Inferno is a searing and haunting memoir of one woman’s journey through the hell of Pinochet’s torture chambers and secret police."—Peter Winn, Tufts University
“Arce’s testimony . . . draws from her direct proximity to and experiences of the machinery of violent death.”—Patrick Timmons, Latin American Research Review
From the Publisher
Living in Latin America
1993 Spanish edition, Planeta
Product Details
Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
|
More About the Author
Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.
Customer Reviews
|
Share your thoughts with other customers:
|
||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Honestly betrayed,
By
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: Inferno: A Story of Terror and Survival in Chile (Living in Latin America) (Paperback)
This book has brought back to me what many surviving torture victims were dealt with, when many found out they survived by selling out other countrymen/ women who disappeared. I see what they suffered in our chilean society to be uncovered and how grotesque the author's accounts were to read in her quest to relay her story. I feel she does a daring job of telling her horrific accounts of abuse and I can now understand what drove her to do just that in order to survive. I recommend this book particularly to women who wish to know how women in chilean society were tortured.
5.0 out of 5 stars
enormous,
By Amellia Camellia (Southwest) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Inferno: A Story of Terror and Survival in Chile (Living in Latin America) (Paperback)
Anyone who thinks that s/he is a human being should read this book---And I don't use the word "should" gratuitously.
Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
|
|
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Tags Customers Associate with This Product(What's this?)Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
|
Sell a Digital Version of This Book in the Kindle Store
If you are a publisher or author and hold the digital rights to a book, you can sell a digital version of it in our Kindle Store.
Learn more
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
Listmania!
|
|
