Ariel Dorfman was the cultural advisor to Chile’s socialist President Salvador Allende. He was forced to leave Chile in 1973 after the U.S.-backed coup by Augusto Pinochet and the death of President Salvador Allende.

As a result, Ariel Dorfman’s life was shattered. He lost his friends, his way of life, his country.

His response was to write about the issues of his life: alienation and loss. Painting all-too-real pictures of social injustice, he became one of South America’s most respected novelists.

Yet Ariel Dorfman says he will never again be entirely healthy as a result of what happened to him on September 11, 1973. His task, therefore, continues to be to take the shards of his life and build something else with them.

His hope now is that perhaps he – and Chile – have something to teach the U.S. about our own shattering experience of September 11, 2001. Watch an interview with him here:

http://www.cbc.ca/thehour/videos.html?id=739099976

People are shattered in different and terrible ways.

Some experiences are intensely personal while others are shared calamities.

Many in Galveston have just had their lives shattered due to Hurricane Ike. Others had their lives shattered long ago due to personal illness or injury. Still others – too many – have been shattered by war, atrocity, loss and displacement.

Some – perhaps all – could be diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder.

Post-traumatic stress disorder is a type of anxiety disorder. It can occur after you’ve seen or experienced a traumatic event that involved the threat of injury or death.¹

Until recently it was not understood and there was no effective treatment.

Now there is evidence that, by using a technique that did not exist in 1973, recovery is possible.

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