McGlothlin, Erin. Perpetrator Trauma

This chapter analyzes the traumatic impact the commission of violence has on its perpetrators (particularly Holocaust perpetrators). The perpetrator has been a covert feature of modern trauma theory from the start in its two most notable manifestations: psychoanalysis, which forms the basis of much recent cultural theory on trauma, and the clinical development of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), which has relied in particular on studies of trauma suffered by combat soldiers. The perpetrator has also inhered in psychiatric accounts that form the basis of PTSD, which draw to a great extent on the traumatization of soldiers in combat. While the aetiology of trauma is very different in the case of the perpetrator of violence than it is in the case of the victim, the symptomatology in both contexts is quite similar, including psychic and somatic aspects such as anxiety, panic, depression, irritability and physical complaints.

Erin McGlothlin,“Perpetrator Trauma.” Routledge Companion to Literature and Trauma. Ed. Colin Davis and Hanna Meretoja.  London: Routledge: 2020: 100-110.