Freedom is highly subjective because its meaning can change from person to person. The story is defined in many ways by the quest for freedom: physical, spiritual, and mental. But how do we know what authentic freedom really is? Sometimes the individual creates a situation in which they are trapped without even knowing it. Unnamed by Yvonne Vera, a woman named Mazvita is raped outside of her village, which begins a journey in which she attempts to free herself from her trauma by erasing her memory. She finds her freedom hindered not only by external forces but also by her own mind. In effect, she becomes her own jailer. She discovers that true freedom can only be achieved by freeing one's memory. Mazvita believes that oblivion is the only path to freedom, but it ends up trapping her. Lavelle writes that Yvonne Vera primarily uses two words to express rape: “whisper” and “silence” (Lavelle 110). Vera writes: “The silence was a treasure. Mazvita felt a calm seep from the earth to her body as he rested above her, pouring his whispered desire over her” (Vera 35). “Whispering” is used to represent the soldier’s violence. Mazvita dissociates herself from her rape, both physically and mentally. “Silence” becomes her way of dealing with the rape where it is said, “she gathered the whispers into a silence that she held tightly within her body (Vera 28). She feels a sense of dismemberment as she lets go and dissociates from her past. It offered a way to escape the trauma, but it was temporary. Without realizing it, Mazvita begins to take a self-destructive path away from freedom. Mazvita becomes mentally unstable as she continues to repress her memories. She subsequently continues to live as if she... middle of paper...... freed from these chains that she needed to face the truth and express herself. Works Cited Lavelle, Ruth. "Unnamed: Recover what was taken." Sign and Taboo: Insights into the poetic fiction of Yvonne Vera. By Robert Muponde. Harare: Weaver, 2003. 109-14. Print.Samuelson, Meg. “Remembering the body: rape and recovery without a name and under the tongue. » Sign and taboo: perspectives on the poetic fiction of Yvonne Vera. By Robert Muponde. Harare: Weaver, 2003. 93-100. Print.Toivanen, Anna-Leena. “Remembering the Nation's Pain Points: Yvonne Vera's Authorial Position as Witness and Healer.” Postcolonial text. Open Humanities Press, 2009. Web. .Vera, Yvonne. Unnamed. Without a name and under the tongue. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2002. 5-116. Print