Читать книгу The Little Prisoner - Jane Elliott - Страница 7

When people talk about evil they are usually thinking of mass murderers like the fictional Hannibal Lecter or dictators like Adolf Hitler, but for most of us our actual encounters with evil are more mundane. There are the school playground bullies and sadistic teachers who turn their victims’ days into nightmares, the unkind care workers in the old people’s homes or the violent thieves who invade the lives of the elderly or infirm. Our brushes with these evils are usually passing or secondhand, but none the less chilling for that.

This, however, is the true story of a four-year-old girl who fell into the power of a man for whom evil was a relentless daily activity. She remained in his power for seventeen years until she eventually managed to escape and turn the tables. It is a story of terror and abuse on a scale that is almost unbelievable, but it also tells of her enormous act of courage which led to the arrest, trial and imprisonment of her persecutor.

Most of us don’t usually hear about children like Jane until we read about their deaths in the papers and then we all wonder how such things could be going on under our noses and under the noses of all the welfare workers who are supposed to be there to help. We try to imagine what can have gone wrong, but we can’t because these children live in a world that is unimaginable to anyone who hasn’t been there. This is the story of a survivor and we should all listen to what she has to tell us.

Jane Elliott’s story is almost unbearable to read in parts, but it needs to be told because the people who perpetrate these sorts of crimes rely on the silence of their victims. If people talk openly about what happens behind closed doors, then evil on the scale of what happened to Jane becomes harder to achieve. Bullies can only operate when other people are too frightened, ashamed or embarrassed to talk about what is being done to them. By telling her story, Jane is making it a little harder for evil to prosper in future.

The names of the characters have all been changed to protect Jane’s identity and the identities of those who helped her in her fight for justice.