Orwell’s Execution

Abstract

The question of the chapter is the role of the witness in a capital execution. In contrast to Foucault, who asserted the becoming-invisible of punishment, Derrida insists that “By definition, there will never have been any invisibility for a legal putting to death . . . the spectacle and the spectator are required.” George Orwell’s early short text “A Hanging” is read very closely here to discern how this essential trait of non-secrecy is put to the test when the witness’s testimony is consigned to a literary text and thus to a set of sealed traces.