A Material Ecocritical Elucidation of Augusta Webster’s “Medea In Athens”, “In an Almshouse”, and “A Dilettante”

Abstract

In addition to her being an avid campaigner of women’s suffrage and education rights, Augusta Webster (1837-1894) is a profoundly important 19th century Victorian female poet who recurrently hearkens to the necessity of obliterating boundaries, dualities, and hierarchical divisions between humans and the physical universe. Diverging from Victorian industrial society’s general propensity of perceiving nature as an inanimate commodity material to be used and abused, Webster, in her poems, captures a biological and a material understanding of the universe in which every natural entity is embedded with actively dynamic agency and vitality. Within this incessantly vibrant universe, humans’ deepest situatedness and innate connectedness to the rest of nature are repeatedly underscored in Webster’s poetry, which shows a sharp contrast to the anthropocentric assumptions of her epoch about humans’ being disparately privileged species on earth. In this regard, the main goal of this study is to analyze Augusta Webster’s “Medea in Athens”, “In an Almshouse”, and “A Dilettante” from the perspective of a recently emerging critical theory of material ecocriticism to reveal Webster’s uniquely significant ecological consciousness about the vital materiality of the universe. These poems are particularly significant in their painstaking effort to unfold the material consanguinity between human-nonhuman beings.

Keywords

• Augusta Webster
• Material Ecocriticism
• Victorian Poetry
• Nature
• Vibrant Matter

Augusta Webster’ın “Medea In Athens”, “In an Almshouse”, ve “A Dilettante” Başlıklı Şiirlerinin Maddesel Ekoeleştirel İncelemesi

Abstract

Augusta Webster (1837-1894) kadınların oy kullanma ve eğitim haklarının savunan ateşli bir aktivist olmasına ek olarak, insan ve fiziksel çevre arasındaki sınırların, hiyerarşik sınıflandırmanın ve ikilemlerin ortadan kaldırılmasına dikkat eden, 19. Yüzyıl Viktorya döneminin son derece önemli bir kadın şairidir. Viktorya dönemi sanayi toplumunun, doğayı kullanılacak ve istismar edilecek cansız bir meta malzemesi olarak görme yönündeki eğiliminden ayrılan Webster, şiirlerinde, her doğal varlığın aktif olarak dinamik bir eyleyicilik içinde olduğu, biyolojik ve maddesel bir evren anlayışını benimser. Her an yeni bir eylem halinde olan bu evrende, insanların doğanın içindeki en derin konumu ve doğuştan içiçe geçmişliği, Webster'ın şiirinde defalarca vurgulanır ve insanların yeryüzünde ayrıcalıklı türler olduğuna dair kendi döneminin insan merkezli varsayımlarıyla keskin bir tezat oluşturur. Bu bağlamda, bu çalışmanın temel amacı, Augusta Webster'ın “Medea in Athens”,”In an Almshouse”, and “A Dilettante” adlı şiirlerini yakın zamanda ortaya çıkan maddesel ekoeleştiri teorisi perspektifinden analiz ederek, Webster'ın evrenin yaşamsal maddeselliği hakkındaki son derecede önemli ekolojik bilincini ortaya çıkarmaktır. Bu şiirler, insan ve insan dışı varlıklar arasındaki maddesel bağlılaşımı ortaya çıkarmaları yönünden ayrı bir önem oluşturmaktadırlar.

Keywords

• Augusta Webster
• Maddesel Ekoeleştiri
• Viktorya Dönemi Şiiri
• Doğa
• Maddenin Eyleyiciliği

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