DESPERATE LOVERS VERSUS TYRANT BELOVEDS: THE MASTER-SLAVE ANALOGY IN THE POEMS OF JOHN KEATS AND FELICIA HEMANS

Year 2021, Volume: 22 Issue: 40, 125 - 152, 31.01.2021

Hediye Özkan

https://doi.org/10.21550/sosbilder.781469

Abstract

Although love of nature as a source of inspiration is one of the primary themes in Romantic period, romantic love, which conveys the passion, pleasure, or the pain of love, often appears as a common theme in Romantic poetry. Romantic poetry becomes as a fertile space where some of the poets explore romantic love as a powerful, intense, and irresistible emotion that gives pain and melancholy rather than pleasure and happiness. I argue that the uneasy relationship between the lovers and beloveds in Romantic poetry, particularly in poems of John Keats and Felicia Hemans parallels with a long-lasting theme, the pain of love, depicted through the sultan-servant or master-slave analogy in Ottoman Divan poetry. Discussing the function of master-slave analogy in Ottoman Divan poetry and theorizing love within philosophical and scientific contexts with the ideas of Ficino and Hegel, this paper examines how Keats and Hemans employ this analogy in their poems and explore the pain of love to demonstrate the power dynamics between the lovers and beloveds.

Keywords

Romantic Poetry, Divan Poetry, Love, John Keats, Felicia Hemans

Umutsuz Âşıklara Karşı Zalim Maşuklar: John Keats ve Felicia Hemans’ın Şiirlerindeki Efendi-Köle Benzetmesi

Abstract

İlham kaynağı olarak tabiata duyulan aşk Romantik dönemin ana temalarından biri olsa da, sevgiliye duyulan aşk, tutkuyu hazzı ve aşk acısını ileten Romantik şiirde oldukça sık rastlanan tematik bir öğedir. Romantik şiir bazı şairlerin sevgiliye duyulan aşkı haz ve mutluluk yerine melankoli ve acı veren güçlü, yoğun ve karşı konulamaz bir his olarak ele aldıkları verimli bir alan oluşturmaktadır. Özellikle John Keats ve Felicia Hemans’ın şiirlerindeki âşık ve maşuk arasındaki huzursuz ilişki, Osmanlı Divan şiirinde sultan-kul ya da efendi-köle benzetmesi ile resmedilen aşk acısı teması ile benzerlik göstermektedir. Divan şiirindeki efendi-köle benzetmesini tartışan ve Ficino ve Hegel’in aşk üzerine düşüncelerini filozofik ve bilimsel çerçeveler içinde ele alan bu çalışma, Keats ve Hemans’ın âşık ve maşuk arasındaki güç dinamiğini göstermek için bu benzetmeyi ve aşk acısını şiirleriyle bütünleştirdiklerini inceler. 

Keywords

John Keats, Felicia Hemans, romantik şiir, Divan şiiri, aşk

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