VISION, REPRESENTATION AND THE DISCOURSE OF THE GAZE IN THE WAVES

Öz

Bu makale Virginia Woolf’un The Waves adlı eserinde hem görsel semboller hem de bununla beraber sözlü semboller arasında olan ilişkiyi inceler. Bakışın anlatımı yoluyla, romanın hem iç hem de dış yapıları ressamsı bir görüş inşa eder ve bu durumu da sadece Jacques Lacan’ın psikolojik terimlerinde olduğu gibi değil, ayrıca Roland Barthes’ın semiyolojisinde de birer sembol olarak algılamak mümkündür. Bu arada bir yandan romanın karakterlerinin iç bakışları ve ayrıca yine bu karakterlerin arasındaki dikkatli bakışları, romanın iç metinsel biçimlerini ve dış metinsel biçimlerini gösterir ve buna ek olarak sözlü anlatımın da bir hayli uyumlu bir yapıya sahip olmasını sağlar. Ayrıca diğer bir yandan romanın perde arkasını biçimci unsurların bir ifadesi olarak da okuyabilmek mümkündür ve bununla beraber köklü bir manevi gerçekliği –ruh hali- göstermek için sanatsal görünümü ve sanatsal dizaynı bir araya getirir. Köklü olan sembol de kendisinin saf sanatsal yapısı ile örtüşür. Hem Duncan Grant’in Window, South of France adlı resmi gibi görsel bir sembolde hem de Virginia Woolf’un kelimelerle resim yapmış olduğu gibi, bir okuyucunun görünüm ve dizaynın uyumunu gösteren renkleri de, şekilleri de ve satırları da açıkça görebilmesi mümkündür. Hem sözlü anlatım biçimi hem de resmin kendisi insanlığın dalgalarında sanatsal oluşumun entelektüel ve duygusal yönlerini sentez yapmanın yollarıdır.

Anahtar Sözcükler: Bakış, Görünüm, Dizayn, Sembol, Biçim, Anlatım, Söylev.

VISION, REPRESENTATION AND THE DISCOURSE OF THE GAZE IN THE WAVES

Abstract: This article explores the relation between visual and verbal representation in Virginia Woolf’s The Waves (1931). Through the discourse of the Gaze, both the inner and outer forms of the novel are constructed as a painter-like vision, which can be seen as signs not only in Jacob Lacan’s psychological terms, but also in Roland Barthes’s semiotics. On the one hand, inward-gazes and inter-gazes of characters indicate the inner and the outer textual forms of the novel, providing a coherent structure of the verbal narrative. On the other hand, the interlude of the novel can be read as an expression of Formalist elements, combining artistic vision and design together, in order to show the essential spiritual reality which is known as “the state of mind”. The representation of the essential being is in its artistic pure form. In a visual representation, such as Duncan Grant’s painting, Window, South of France (1928), the reader can see the way in which colours, shapes and lines also demonstrate the harmony of vision and design in Woolf’s painting in words. Both verbal narrative form and the painting itself are ways to synthesise intellectual and emotional aspects of an artistic creation in the waves of humanity.

Keywords: Gaze, Vision, Design, Representation, Form, Narrative, Discours.

Anahtar Kelimeler

• Bakış,Görünüm,Dizayn,Sembol,Biçim,Anlatım,Söylev

VISION, REPRESENTATION AND THE DISCOURSE OF THE GAZE IN THE WAVES

Abstract

model. The essential character Percival holds the coherence of the whole novel. He is an abstract model, because the reader can only perceive Percival via other characters’ eyes. The image of this essential character has been shaped by multi-layered vision among other characters. In other words, Percival reveals the inter-subjectivity, which constructs the inner form of the novel. As the representation of the multi-layered vision, this character also reinforces the inter-subjectivity. Tamar Katz claims that the reader is able to find two kinds of concept, in order to define subjectivity in The Waves – one is the philosophical self – which is abstract and essential, and is detached from social, economical and cultural surroundings. The other self is defined by social codes, such as gender and class (1995: 234). Woolf’s “I” in this novelis a metaphor of “multiple subject positions” (Greene, 1999: 217).Here, I would argue, the “I” in The Waves indicates the “eye”. The narrator “I” can be seen as a way to perceive the external world. Barthes’s and Lacan’s theories of the Gaze also help to contribute to the theoretical development of the discourse of the Gaze, which is quite useful to observe the textual form of The Waves, in terms of vision and representation. In “Right in the Eyes”, Roland Barthes defined the formation of “the Gaze” (1991: 237). First of all, Barthes claimed that the Gaze is not a sign – because the sign repeats itself, so that the viewer is able to recognize it, while the sign

Keywords

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Kaynakça

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24. VISION, REPRESENTATION AND THE DISCOURSE OF THE GAZE IN THE WAVES Abstract: This article explores the relation between visual and verbal representation in Virginia Woolf’s The Waves (1931). Through the discourse of the Gaze, both the inner and outer forms of the novel are constructed as a painter-like vision, which can be seen as signs not only in