MARY SHELLEY’NİN MATHILDA ADLI ESERİNİN EKOFEMİNİST ANALİZİ: KENDİ TABU KURGUSUNU YAZAN KADIN ANLATICI

Year 2023, Volume: 25 Issue: 3, 994 - 1007, 15.09.2023

Tuğba Karabulut

https://doi.org/10.16953/deusosbil.1260838

Abstract

Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley’nin kısa romanı Mathilda’yı yirmi birinci yüzyılda ecofeminist bir bakış açısı ile yeniden okumak, çok yönlü bakış açılarıyla çağdaş eleştirilere ışık tutar. Mathilda’nın taslağının, 1959 yılında Elizabeth Nitchie tarafından mikrofilminden kopyası çıkartılarak basılması, İngiliz edebiyat tarihinde bir dönüm noktasıdır. Başta babası William Godwin olmak üzere, yazarın erkek akrabaları tarafından yüzyıldan fazla bir zaman saklanan eserin basımı, devrim niteliğinde bir tabu kurgusunu gözler önüne serer. 1819-1820 yılları arasında yazılan bu eser, Shelley’nin hayattayken tamamladığı tek eser olma niteliğine sahiptir. Ustaca kurgulanan eser, babasının kendisine karşı beslediği ensest sevgisini itiraf etmesinden dolayı, toplumdan kendisini soyutlayıp doğayla bütünleşerek yaşayan ana karakter Mathilda’nın travmatik itiraflarını ve intihar eğilimini betimleyen mektuplarını içerir. Hak ettiğinden daha az değer gören Mathilda’nın, edebiyat eleştirmenleri tarafından genellikle otobiyografik açıdan ve ensest temasıyla ilişkilendirilerek yorumlanması, eserin edebi değerlerini azaltmaktadır. Oysa bu eser, feminist ve ekolojik kuramlar ve kadın yazını ile de bağdaşmaktadır. Bu makale, analizini biyografik bağlamın ve yazarın yaşam deneyimlerinin dışında tutarak ve ecofeminist kuramları ele alarak, kadın anlatıcının kendi tabu kurmacasını yazmasında doğanın nasıl etkin bir rol üstlendiğini göstermeyi amaçlar. Ayrıca bu çalışma, ekofeminizmi kadın yazını ile harmanlayarak, kadın ve doğa arasındaki ilişkiyi de araştırır ve kadın karakteri, kendi tabu hikayesini, feminist bir bakış açısıyla ve doğayla ilişki içinde cesurca kurgulayarak ve on dokuzuncu yüzyıl erkek egemen Romantik akımının geleneklerine karşı gelerek yazınsal düzeye nasıl taşıdığını tartışır.

Keywords

Mary Shelley, Mathilda, Ekofeminizm, Tabu Kurmacası, Doğa, Kadın Yazını

AN ECOFEMINIST ANALYSIS OF MARY SHELLEY’S MATHILDA: THE FEMALE NARRATOR WRITING HER OWN TABOO FICTION

Abstract

Re-reading Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley’s novelette, Mathilda, in the twenty-first century from an ecofeminist perspective sheds a new light on contemporary criticism, opening up multifaceted perspectives. There was a critical moment in British literary history when Elizabeth Nitchie transcribed Mathilda from the microfilm of the manuscript and published it in 1959, which unveiled this piece of revolutionary taboo fiction suppressed for over a century by the author’s male relatives, chiefly Shelley’s father, William Godwin. Written in 1819-1820, Mathilda is the only work completed during Shelley’s lifetime. It is an artfully crafted epistolary work depicting the traumatic confessions and suicidal tendencies of the protagonist, Mathilda, a woman who isolated herself from society by integrating herself with nature due to her father’s confession for his incestuous passion towards her. Regarded as an underrated work, Mathilda has often been interpreted from biographical and incest-related perspectives by literary critics, which relegates its literary merits although it is in accordance with feminist and ecological theories and feminine writing. This paper, avoiding biographical accounts and the author’s life experiences and with theories consistent with those of ecofeminism, intends to show how nature functions as an effective instrument for the female writer to fictionalize her taboo story. By blending ecofeminism with feminine writing, this paper also investigates the interplay between woman and nature, and navigates how a female character courageously relocates her taboo story on a textual level from a feminist perspective in a natural setting, challenging the male-dominant Romantic tradition of the nineteenth century.

Keywords

Mary Shelley, Mathilda, Ecofeminism, Taboo Fiction, Nature, Feminine Writing

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