IMAGINARUL MANIPULĂRII ÎN PIESA ULTIMA BACANTĂ [THE LAST BACCHANT] (CĂTĂLINA FLORINA FLORESCU)

In the play Ultima bacantă [The Last Bacchant], Cătălina Florina Florescu blurs the boundary between personal traumatic space and institutional environments, offering a piercing case study of the imaginary of manipulation within contemporary power structures. An analysis of Thalia, a young teacher placed under the direct authority of her aggressor, reveals how an organization, such as the School Inspectorate, becomes an incubator for coercive symbolic representations. Manipulation is not limited to the brutal act of abuse prior to the job interview; it extends through a process of "naturalizing" dominance within everyday professional life. Rather than functioning solely as an individual actor, the aggressor-director serves as a symbol of infallible authority, safeguarded by his prestigious title. Through this mechanism, the extreme asymmetrical relationship is perceived as an "inevitable" state of affairs, where the victim is pressured to interiorize silence as a form of professional ethics or economic survival. The system of symbolic manipulation functions here by transforming the educational space into a disciplinary apparatus, where Thalia’s identity is fragmented between pedagogical duty and unnamed trauma. This "circulation" of a hierarchy based on impunity validates the notion that certain bodies are more valuable than others, legitimizing dominance through the very administrative structure meant to provide protection. However, by invoking the archetype of the "Bacchant," Florescu proposes a deconstruction of this imaginary. While serving as an act of personal justice, the character’s symbolic revolt fundamentally unveils the institutional production of convenient "truths" designed to conceal systemic violence. Thus, the play demonstrates that the most effective manipulation is that which transforms abuse into an invisible yet omnipresent component of the social order, forcing the audience to question the legitimacy of any authority that thrives on the dispossession of a subject’s voice and bodily autonomy.