BREAKING THE SILENCE: WOMAN AS A SUBJECT IN PAT BARKER’S THE SILENCE OF THE GIRLS

Year 2021, Volume: 61 Issue: 2, 841 - 863, 28.12.2021

Merve Altın

https://doi.org/10.33171/dtcfjournal.2021.61.2.9

Cited By: 1

Abstract

Pat Barker’s latest novel The Silence of the Girls (2018) retells the events taking place in The Iliad from the perspective of Briseis, Achilles’ bed-slave. The aim of this paper is to analyse The Silence of the Girls in the light of écriture feminine, a term coined by Hélène Cixous in her essay, “The Laugh of Medusa” first published in 1975. It is found out that in her novel, The Silence of the Girls, Barker foregrounds the notions of the female body, female voice and experience, and thus, problematises the dominant and hegemonic systems of representation in language and culture by focusing on the female body, female voice and experience. Moreover, this study asserts that the concept of bisexuality, one of the important features of écriture feminine, is also evident in the novel as the author also writes from the perspectives of male characters, Achilles and Patroclus. In that sense, the depiction of male perspective and experience also helps to challenge and undermine the notions of heroism and masculinity that are one of the most persisting elements in Western myths and culture. It is concluded that The Silence of the Girls challenges and debunks the age-old patriarchal systems of representation that subdue the female body, voice, perspective and experience by proposing a new kind of female subjectivity that frustrates the phallocentric representations of female characters in the works of literature drawing their sources from myths, age-old cultural assumptions and practices.

Keywords

Pat Barker, The Silence of the Girls, Helene Cixous, Ecriture feminine, Homer, The Iliad, Myth, Rewriting

BREAKING THE SILENCE: WOMAN AS A SUBJECT IN PAT BARKER’S THE SILENCE OF THE GIRLS

Abstract

Pat Barker'ın son romanı Kızların Suskunluğu (2018), İlyada Destanı’nı Akhilleus’un yatak kölesi Briseis'in bakış açısıyla anlatmaktadır. Bu makalenin amacı, Kızların Suskunluğu romanını Hélène Cixous'un ilk kez 1975'te yayınlanan “Medusa'nın Gülüşü” adlı makalesinde ortaya attığı bir terim olan dişil yazı (écriture feminine) bakış açısıyla incelemektir. Barker’ın Kızların Suskunluğu romanında kadın bedeni, kadın deneyimi ve kadın sesi kavramlarını ön plana çıkardığı ve böylece dil ve kültürde egemen ve etkili olan temsil sistemlerini kadın bedeni, kadın deneyimi ve kadın sesi üzerine odaklanarak sorunsallaştırdığı sonucuna varılmıştır. Bununla birlikte, dişil yazının önemli özelliklerinden biri olan biseksüellik kavramının bu romanda var olduğu, Barker’ın kadın bir yazar olarak erkek karakterlerden Akhilleus ve Patroclus'un bakış açılarına yer verildiği ileri sürülmektedir. Bu anlamda, erkek karakterlerin bakış açılarının ve deneyiminin tasviri, Batı mitleri ve kültürünün en önemli unsurlarından biri olan kahramanlık ve erkeklik kavramlarına meydan okumaya ve bu kavramları sorunsallaştırmaya yardımcı olur. Kızların Suskunluğu romanının kadın karakterlerin fallusmerkezli temsillerini boşa çıkaran yeni bir tür kadın öznelliği ileri sürerek, kadın bedenini, sesini, bakış açısını ve deneyimini boyunduruk altına alan asırlık ataerkil temsil sistemlerine meydan okuduğu ve bunları çürüttüğü sonucuna varılır.

Keywords

Pat Barker, The Silence of the Girls, Helene Cixous, Dişil yazı, Homeros, İlyada destanı, mit, Yeniden yazım

References

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