Mary Elizabeth Braddon’ın Lady Audley's Secret Adlı Romanında Sansasyon, Toplumsal Cinsiyetler ve Kimlik Politikası

Year 2022, Volume: 7 Issue: 1, 122 - 136, 29.04.2022

Kerim Can Yazgünoğlu

https://doi.org/10.29110/soylemdergi.1053339

Abstract

Viktorya döneminin en iyi sansasyonel romanlarından biri olarak kabul edilen Mary Elizabeth Braddon’ın Lady Audley’s Secret (1862), Viktorya dönemi idealleri tarafından inşa edilen yapay sınırların ihlalini göstererek kimlikleri, cinsiyetleri ve eve ait idealleri yeniden düşünmek için yeni bir alan sunmaktadır. Bunu yaparken, roman, evlilik, ev, kadın ve erkek olmaya dair sorgulamalarıyla, başkahramanı Lady Audley'in ne olduğunu gizlemek için bazı maskeler takarken Viktorya döneminin eve ait normlarının ötesine geçme konusundaki geleneklere uymayan girişimine odaklanır. Bu bağlamda, toplumsal cinsiyet çalışmalarından yola çıkan bu makale, toplumsal cinsiyete dayalı kimliklerin söylemsel pratiklerin etkileri olarak nasıl üretildiğini ve yerleştirildiğini ve Braddon’ın toplumsal cinsiyet edimselliğini ve toplumsal cinsiyet akışkanlığını kabul ederek romandaki toplumsal cinsiyetlerin istikrarını nasıl yıktığını araştırıyor. Bu istikrarsızlaştırma, Viktorya döneminin kadın kimliği ve kimlik politikaları hakkındaki daha geniş soruları gündeme getirmektedir. Makale, bu sorulara bazı cevaplar ararken, romanın toplumsal cinsiyetlerle ilgili belirgin ataerkil varsayımlara nasıl meydan okuduğunu ve hegemonik ataerkilliğin ötesine nasıl geçtiğini incelemektedir.

Keywords

Mary Elizabeth Braddon, Lady Audley’s Secret, sansasyon roman, kimlikler, toplumsal cinsiyetler, edimsellik.

Sensation, Genders, and Identity Politics in Mary Elizabeth Braddon’s Lady Audley’s Secret

Abstract

Mary Elizabeth Braddon’s Lady Audley’s Secret (1862), considered one of the best sensational novels in the Victorian age, offers a new space for re-considering identities, genders, and domestic ideals by demonstrating the transgression of the artificial boundaries established by the Victorian ideals. In doing so, the novel, with its questionings of marriage, home, and being woman and man, focuses on the protagonist Lady Audley’s nonconforming attempt to go beyond the Victorian domestic norms as she wears some masks to hide what she is. In this context, drawing upon gender studies, this article explores how gendered identities are produced and installed as the effects of discursive practices, and how Braddon breaks down the stability of genders in the novel by acknowledging gender performativity and gender fluidity. This destabilization raises broader questions about the female identity and identity politics of the Victorian age. In searching for some answers to these questions, the article scrutinizes how the novel challenges the trenchant patriarchal assumptions about genders and goes beyond hegemonic patriarchy.

Keywords

Mary Elizabeth Braddon, Lady Audley's Secret, sensation novel, identities, genders, performativity

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