History Main / DumbStruck

* ''Literature/TheSilenceOfMurder'': When Jeremy was nine, he sang in the car and said that he got the song from God. Rita slapped him in the face and screamed, "God don't sing!" Jeremy hasn't spoken since then. He could still communicate by writing, but since Coach Johnson's murder he won't even do that.
* This is the plot of the Creator/ELKonigsburg book ''Silent to the Bone.'' The character who's silenced is accused of dropping his little sister and nearly killing her. However, this seems out-of-character for him, and his best friend tries to work with him to make him speak again. [[spoiler: In fact, it was a negligent nanny. However, I believe the boy had a crush on her, so he kept silent.]]
* Marina in John Marsden's ''So Much To Tell You'', who stopped talking after a disfiguring acid burn. The only time she speaks is at the end when she gives the TitleDrop to her father. This is continued in the POVSequel ''Take My Word For It'', although she gets more dialogue after the above has occurred.

Contrast with ElectiveMute, which is when a character is intentionally quiet. See also SarcasmFailure and {{Angrish}}. Also see SilenceOfSadness for when someone ''can'' speak while they're sad, but they just choose to speak less. Also, with Silence of Sadness, the reason might not be outright traumatic, but it can be.

* ''Fanfic/Danganronpa2GoodbyeDenial'': Souda Kazuichi goes into a severe downward spiral thanks to the shock of the first murder and trial. While able to mumble out a few things when pressed, speaking proves very difficult for him; his primary means of communication becomes [[spoiler:a mechanical doll]] which he uses as a soundboard.

* Helen, the unspeaking young woman in Hitchcock's ''Film/TheSpiralStaircase'', is considered mute, but actually has not spoken since childhood, due to an early trauma. Her silence is an essential part of the film.
* In ''Film/TheOthers2001'', Lydia is mute. Grace finds out this was caused by Lydia [[spoiler:finding out that she and the other servants had died]].
* In ''Film/ThorRagnarok'' after Odin greets Loki as his son despite all their quarrels, Loki does not dare to say a word [[spoiler:until his father's death.]]
* Tiffany in ''Film/HellboundHellraiserII'' falls under the "psychological trauma" type thanks to witnessing her mother's murder and then being imprisoned in a psychiatric hospital by the killer, who pushed her growing obsession with puzzles into a full-blown compulsion. She does eventually get better.
* In ''Film/TheShadowOfChikara'', Dancer has been unable to speak (and generally 'not right in the head') ever since he was attacked and scarred by a huge eagle.

* This is the plot of the Creator/ELKonigsburg book ''Silent to the Bone.'' The character who's silenced is accused of dropping his little sister and nearly killing her. However, this seems out-of-character for him, and his best friend tries to work with him to make him speak again. [[spoiler: In fact, it was a negligent nanny. However, I believe the boy had a crush on her, so he kept silent.]]

* Marina in John Marsden's ''So Much To Tell You'', who stopped talking after a disfiguring acid burn. The only time she speaks is at the end when she gives the TitleDrop to her father. This is continued in the POVSequel ''Take My Word For It'', although she gets more dialogue after the above has occurred.
* [[spoiler: Katniss]] has a short bout of this in ''[[Literature/TheHungerGames Mockingjay]]'' [[spoiler: after Prim, her sister, dies]].
* In ''Literature/HannibalRising'', a young Hannibal Lecter is rendered mute after witnessing his beloved little sister Mischa being murdered and cannibalized by starving Nazis during a brutal winter in World War II.
* In the ''Mage Winds'' trilogy of ''Literature/HeraldsOfValdemar'', a magical tragedy devastates the Tayledras k'Sheyna clan, leading many of the mages involved to [[MeaningfulRename change]] [[ThatManIsDead their names]]. A particularly traumatized woman ceases speaking entirely (except mind-to-mind) and calls herself "Silence." When the damage is repaired, she changes her name to "Snowfire" and starts talking again.
* In ''Literature/TheAmyVirus'', Cyan, who is autistic, loses the ability to speak for several weeks after she falls ill from stress.
* In ''Literature/TheWitchlands'', Owl doesn't speak, likely because of the trauma of whatever happened to her before Aeduen and Iseult met her.

* ''Literature/TheSilenceOfMurder'': When Jeremy was nine, he sang in the car and said that he got the song from God. Rita slapped him in the face and screamed, "God don't sing!" Jeremy hasn't spoken since then. He could still communicate by writing, but since Coach Johnson's murder he won't even do that.
* Erin from ''Literature/TheNowhereGirls'' goes nonverbal for two days after she escapes an AttemptedRape by Eric Jordan.

* The girl in ''Series/{{Firefly}}'', in the village that kidnaps Simon and River; River reads her mind, leading to the village wanting to burn her as a witch and the trope-naming BigDamnHeroes moment.

* Felipe in the 1990 New World version of ''Franchise/{{Zorro}}''. In Isabel Allende's novel version, Bernardo's fate is similar, but his muteness is a choice rather than an affliction.
* One of a couple of possible explanations for Ike's muteness in ''Series/TheYoungRiders''.
* In an episode of ''Series/ILoveLucy'', Fred (a notorious penny-pincher) is completely unable to speak after realizing he wasted hundreds of dollars on a [[TheAllegedCar lemon]].
* In one episode of ''Series/BarneyAndFriends'', Kathy is afraid of an upcoming doctor visit, and has to be cheered up before she can talk.
* When Series/{{Buffy|The Vampire SLayer}} is brought back from the dead at the beginning of Season 6, her uncanny silence (in a character famous for her {{Bond One Liner}}s and DeadpanSnarker commentary) shows that she is NotHerself.

* Pilika in ''VideoGame/SuikodenII''.

* In ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyCrystalChronicles: Ring of Fates'' this happens to Chelinka after the twins survive a monster attack that kills their dad. [[spoiler:She eventually recovers from it, and is able to speak again.]]
* Max in ''VideoGame/ShiningForce: Resurrection of the Dark Dragon'' [[spoiler:loses his voice when Darksol kills Kane, his brother. He remains this way until the very last scene of the game.]]

* In ''VideoGame/AssassinsCreedII'', Ezio's mother Maria goes mute after witnessing the deaths of her husband and two of her sons and being abused by the city guards who arrested them, and spends much of the next 20 years praying beside her bed. Should the player gather 100 feathers she begins to speak again, and by the time of ''VideoGame/AssassinsCreedBrotherhood'' has recovered.
* In ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaMajorasMask'', Lulu is so distraught over the theft of the eggs she laid that she is largely unable to speak or sing. Due to her being the lead singer of the Indigo-Gos, this required the band to cancel their scheduled performances. Summoning the Turtle with the New Wave Bossa Nova is enough to snap her out of it.
* At the beginning of ''VideoGame/AITheSomniumFiles'', Mizuki Okiura becomes mute after [[HarmfulToMinors discovering her mother's dead body]]. She gets better after either Agent Date [[JourneyToTheCenterOfTheMind explores her Somnium]] or she gets comfort from her CoolTeacher.

* Paramount's 1963 Modern Madcap "Crumley Cogwheel" has the titular character a drone in an office pool who is called into the boss's office because in the twenty years he's worked for the company--Michigan Nuts And Bolts--he has never asked for a raise. His timidness leaves him tongue-tied and incapable of rational speech, so he is given a week to ask for a raise or be fired. Cogwheel apparently finds the courage through liquid courage...he gets drunk during a lunch break, interrupts a board meeting and forcibly demands a raise.

* Maya Angelou, as described in her memoir ''I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings'', spent five years of her childhood nearly mute, believing that if she spoke, her words would be responsible for someone getting killed. This came about due to a traumatic incident when she was eight, when she was sexually abused and raped by her mother's boyfriend and she confessed what had happened to her brother, who told the rest of her family. The boyfriend spent one day in jail, but was found beaten to death four days after his release, and Angelou came to feel as though she had caused his death by speaking out and became so afraid of the power of her own words that she didn't want to say anything. Angelou credits her teacher Bertha Flowers for helping her to speak again (as well as introducing her to the classics of literature that would later serve as the foundation for her later career as a writer, poet, actress, and civil rights activist).

[[folder:Films —- Animated]]

[[DescribeTopicHere Describe Dumb Struck Here]]

* At the beginning of ''VideoGame/AITheSomniumFiles'', Mizuki Okiura becomes mute after discovering her mother's dead body. She gets better after either Agent Date explores her Somnium (dream) or she gets comfort from her teacher.

* Uwe Boll's ''Film/{{Alone in the Dark|2005}}'' traumatized WebVideo/TheNostalgiaCritic enough that he had to review the movie through a text-to-speech program on his laptop. Since he didn't want the whole review to go like that, [[WebVideo/AtopTheFourthWall Linkara]] and [[WebVideo/TheSpoonyExperiment Spoony]] [[{{Crossover}} volunteered to help him]].

* In ''Film/TheOthers'', Lydia is mute. Grace finds out this was caused by Lydia [[spoiler:finding out that she and the other servants had died]].

* Wrestling/TheYoungBucks went from a celebratory high to this when the entire ''Wrestling/{{R|ingOfHonor}}OH'' production crashed at the 2016 ''Final Battle'' and rebooted with [[Wrestling/MattHardy Broken Matt]] projected [[TheCracker on the main screen]] ranting about bringing [[Wrestling/JeffHardy Brother Nero]] back to get rid them and The Briscoes.[[/folder]]

* Maya Angelou, as described in her memoir ''I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings'', spent five years of her childhood nearly mute, believing that if she spoke, her words would be responsible for someone getting killed. This came about due to a traumatic incident when she was eight, when she was sexually abused and raped by her mother's boyfriend and she confessed what had happened to her brother, who told the rest of her family. The boyfriend spent one day in jail, but was found beaten to death four days after his release, and Angelou came to feel as though she had caused his death by speaking out and became so afraid of the power of her own words that she didn't want to say anything. Angelou credits her teacher Bertha Flowers for helping her to speak again (as well as introducing her to the classics of literature that would later serve as the foundation for her later career as a writer, poet, actress and civil rights activist).

* [[spoiler: Bill Cipher]] undergoes this in Chapter Seventeen of ''Fanfic/ATriangleInTheStars'' after Steven asks him an ArmorPiercingQuestion, mostly because he wasn't expecting Steven to stick around long enough to ask. It's temporary though, but he describes it as a computer going BSOD.
* ''Fanfic/ADiplomaticVisit'':
** In chapter 1 of the sequel ''Diplomat at Large'', Thorax is left speechless when Pharynx points out that his new antlers make him look like a moose. Pharynx is left wishing for a camera to immortalize that expression.
** Chapter 5 of the second sequel, ''Diplomacy Through Schooling'', set nearly a year after Pharynx left Thorax speechless with a comment, has Thorax do almost the same to Pharynx when he reveals he's finally found a life partner.
* In ''Fanfic/HerMax'', Max is a toddler who stops talking after his parents die.

* James Corbett encountered someone like this when he was assigned to hunt down a maneating tiger by UsefulNotes/TheRaj. She was a woman who tried unsuccessfully to save her sister from a tiger, and ended up witnessing her sister's death before being chased by the tiger herself. Her family told Corbett she had not spoken since the attack, which took place a year before Corbett met her. She began speaking again after Corbett killed the tiger and showed her its skin, although Corbett himself was skeptical that this was the only factor in her recovery.

* Autistic individuals sometimes have this happen to them as a reaction to being overwhelmed, experiencing [[SensoryOverload sensory overload,]] or facing extreme stress, as well as other reasons; although in this case it would be called going nonverbal.

* In ''VideoGame/AssassinsCreedII'' Ezio's mother Maria goes mute after witnessing the deaths of her husband and two of her sons and being abused by the city guards who arrested them, and spends much of the next 20 years praying beside her bed. Should the player gather 100 feathers she begins to speak again, and by the time of ''VideoGame/AssassinsCreedBrotherhood'' has recovered.

* The character known as Grace in ''Film/DeadAgain'' starts the movie only able to talk in her sleep, but not at all while awake. It turns out she's having PastLife problems.

* Max in ''VideoGame/ShiningForce'' and its remake ''Shining Force: Resurrection of the Dark Dragon''

* Maya Angelou, as described in her memoir ''I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings'', spent five years of her childhood nearly mute, believing that if she spoke, her words would be responsible for someone getting killed. This came about due to a traumatic incident when she was eight, when she was sexually abused and raped by her mother's boyfriend and she confessed what had happened to her brother, who told the rest of her family. The boyfriend spent one day in jail, but was found beaten to death four days after his release. Angelou credits her teacher Bertha Flowers for helping her to speak again, as well as introducing her to the classics of literature that would later serve as the foundation for her later career as a writer, poet, actress and civil rights activist.

* Maya Angelou, who wrote ''I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings'', spent five years of her childhood nearly mute, believing that if she spoke, her words would be responsible for someone getting killed. This came about due to a traumatic incident when she was eight, when she was sexually abused and raped by her mother's boyfriend and she confessed what had happened to her brother, who told the rest of her family. The boyfriend spent one day in jail, but was found beaten to death four days after his release. Angelou credits her teacher Bertha Flowers for helping her to speak again, as well as introducing her to the classics of literature that would later serve as the foundation for her later career as a writer, poet, actress and civil rights activist.

* Maya Angelou, who wrote ''I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings'', spent five years of her childhood nearly mute, believing that if she spoke, her words would be responsible for someone getting killed. This came about due to a traumatic incident when she was eight, when she was sexually abused and raped by her mother's boyfriend and she confessed what had happened to her brother, who told the rest of her family. The boyfriend spent one day in jail, but was found beaten to death four days after his release. Angelou credits her teacher Bertha Flowers for helping her to speak again, as well as introducing her to the classics of literature that would later serve as the foundation for her later career as a writer, poet, actress and civil rights activist.

Contrast with ElectiveMute, which is when a character is intentionally quiet. See also SarcasmFailure and {{Angrish}}.

->"Selective muteness is something a person may not have control over in the beginning. In the case of Her Majesty, I assume the shock of the battle rendered her unable to process her emotions, leading to her silence unless it dealt with the country as a whole."

* A villainous example in ''VisualNovel/MysticMessenger''. in the Secret Ending, after [[spoiler: Saeran fatally shoots V in a fit of hysterics, [[BigBad Rika]] snaps out of her DarkMessiah mindset and realizes that he's really about to die, and [[VillainousBreakdown breaks down screaming and crying.]] After he dies, she all but loses the ability to speak, and is medically diagnosed with aphasia. She only manages to get two words out to anyone, and with great effort, before Zen and Yoosung ship her off to Alaska in secret.]]

* ''Webcomic/AxisPowersHetalia'' fanfic ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/11886910/1/Gankona-Unnachgiebig-Unità Gankona, Unnachgiebig, Unità]]'': "..." had been used several times within the story to signify an inability to speak.

* At the beginning of ''VideoGame/AITheSomniumFiles'', Mizuki Okiura becomes mute after discovering her mother's dead body. She gets better after either Agent Date explores her Somnium (dream) or she gets comfort from her teacher. [[spoiler:She falls silent again if her father and two best friends die, and that's the last you see of her on that route]].

* At the beginning of ''WebComic/SWAPEnsemble'', Patrick Tempo compared it to an object show, and the rest of the group laughed at him. He hasn't spoken a word since.