English 4973 October, 4, 2012 Dorfmans Death and the Maiden Dorfmans play, Death and the Maiden

triggered me to reflect back to an earlier time in my life that I thought Id completely forgotten. At age twenty, I worked at a city police department as a civilian. One day, I was cornered and held down by my male supervisor, a police sergeant. He sexually assaulted and fondled me despite my attempts to ward him off. When I fought back, he punched me so hard that my right arm and shoulder area was black and blue for weeks. It was the seventies, I told no one, and I also knew I had no power within the department. Fast forward thirty years later, I was a retired police officer and was walking the hospital corridor of Vencor (now Kindred) hospital in San Antonio to visit a dying relative. I spotted his name on a room entrance and backed up and looked inside to see my former boss intubated and asleep. I froze. It had been thirty years ago. Now, he was a sick and defensive old man. It was too late for me to ask him to tell the truth, let along get an apology out of him. After I finished reading the play, my only regrets are that the truth never came out as to what had happened to me back then. My supervisor was deeply loved by the department as he was one of the first African-American police officers to make rank. In all honesty, he was a decent guy to me and everyone else. We never discussed what had happened, I was transferred to work in another department and life went on. I moved on, became a police officer myself and never looked back. Like Paulina, I was young, idealistic and forward looking. I thought I could make a difference in this world and do any job that any man could do, equally well. Unlike Paulina, I

was able to follow the career path I had chosen. As a cop, I was never known as a hard-ass. I could go into police mode when needed, but seriously doubt I could have tied up let alone torture a confession out of anybody. I do not recommend seeing the movie before the play. The movie was written for Hollywood and the play was written by a male. I came away from the play with the notion that telling the truth is a huge step towards building trust in any kind of relationship. Even though Dorfmans work is fictional insomuch as he lies to tell the truth, the play is so compelling and well-researched that I came to the conclusion that if I had been there, this would have actually occurred.