Silence and the Reclamation of Voice in Rebecca Hall and Hugo Martínez’s “Wake”

Looking through historical documents, specifically British court documents, related to the 1712 slave revolt in New York, Rebecca Hall encounters the names of four women involved in the revolt. However, their testimony doesn’t exist within the record. Instead, it simply reads, in reference to one of the women, “Having nothing to say for herself than what she had previously said . . .” The historical record erased Sarah, Abigail, Lily, and Amba from existence, presenting their words as unimportant or transcription and silencing them for eternity. Hall must, in her research on women led slave revolts, “read between the lines” of historical documents because the documents erase and silence the individuals.

Surrounded by piles of books and records, Hall narrates, “This is one way history erases us. What we had to say was not even considered important. You think you are reading an accurate chronicle written at the time, but if who we are and what we care about are deemed irrelevant, it won’t be there.” Silence is the absence the sound, the absence of a voice, the absence of an identity. In Wake, Hall and Hugo Martínez use silence, on the page, to drive this point home. They recreate the lives of enslaved women who led various revolts, and they recreate all or portions of some of their stories with only images…