The Second Book of Genesis: Bruno Schulz’s Tactile Matter and the Carnal Hermeneutics of Reading

Öz

This article reads the matter of Bruno Schulz’s fiction (Sklepy cynamonowe, 1934; Sanatorium pod Klepsydrą, 1937) through the question of touch. That matter is alive in Schulz is a settled premise of the scholarship; the article’s contribution is to show that this life is written as something known through, and answerable to, touch, and that the stories model reading itself as such contact. Richard Kearney’s carnal hermeneutics, grounded in Merleau-Ponty’s account of flesh and reversibility, provides the framework. A close reading of the “Treatise on Tailors’ Dummies” in the Polish original shows that matter is the grammatical subject of the father’s sentences, that Schulz’s vocabulary for matter is tactile (puszystość, porowatość, oporność), and that the Treatise itself admits that the quickening hand can turn into domination (manipulacja,gwałt, sadyzm). In “Nemrod” and “Sklepy cynamonowe” touch operates as a mode of knowledge; in “Karakony” the same reversibility becomes a threat, read here with Julia Kristeva’s concept of abjection. The reading presents Schulz as a theorist of the ethics of touch, what Kearney calls “tact,” in addition to the poet of living matter he is already known to be.

Anahtar Kelimeler

• Bruno Schulz
• carnal hermeneutics
• touch
• matter
• abjection
• Treatise on Tailors’ Dummies

Destekleyen Kurum

This study was supported by the Slovenian Research and Innovation Agency, Program No. P6-0156 (Slovenian Linguistics, Literature and Slovenian Language Teaching (2020–2027); head of the program Prof. Dr. Marko Jesenšek).

Teşekkür

In preparing this article the author used an AI assistant (Claude, Anthropic) for language editing, for the translation of the title, abstract and keywords into Turkish, and for formatting the document to the journal’s style.

İkinci Yaratılış Kitabı: Bruno Schulz’da Dokunsal Madde ve Okumanın Tensel Hermenötiği

Öz

Bu makale, Bruno Schulz’un Sklepy cynamonowe (1934) ve Sanatorium pod Klepsydrą (1937) ciltlerindeki maddeyi dokunma sorusu üzerinden okur. Schulz araştırmalarında maddenin canlılığı uzun süredir kabul görmüş bir önermedir; makalenin katkısı, bu canlılığın Schulz’un düzyazısında dokunma yoluyla bilinen ve dokunmaya cevap veren bir şey olarak yazıldığını ve öykülerin okuma edimini de böyle bir temas olarak modellediğini göstermektir. Bu amaçla Richard Kearney’nin, Merleau-Ponty’nin ten ve tersinirlik kavramlarına dayanan tensel hermenötiği temel çerçeve olarak kullanılmıştır. “Terzi Mankenleri Üzerine Traktat”ın Lehçe aslına dayanan yakın okuması, maddenin babanın cümlelerinde dilbilgisel özne konumunda olduğunu, Schulz’un madde sözlüğünün dokunsal olduğunu (puszystość, porowatość, oporność) ve traktatın kendisinin, maddeye can veren elin tahakküme dönüşebileceğini (manipulacja, gwałt, sadyzm) kabul ettiğini ortaya koymaktadır. “Nemrod” ve “Sklepy cynamonowe” öykülerinde dokunma bir bilme biçimi olarak, “Karakony” öyküsünde ise aynı tersinirlik, Julia Kristeva’nın iğrençlik kavramıyla ele alınan bir tehdit olarak izlenmektedir. Bu okuma, Schulz’u canlı maddenin şairi olarak bilinen konumunun yanı sıra, dokunmanın etiğini, Kearney’nin deyişiyle tact’ı düşünen bir yazar olarak konumlandırır.

Anahtar Kelimeler

• Bruno Schulz
• tensel hermenötik
• dokunma
• madde
• iğrençlik
• Terzi Mankenleri Üzerine Traktat

Kaynakça

1. Aristotle. De Anima (On the Soul). Translated by Hugh Lawson-Tancred. Penguin, 1986.
2. Bakhtin, Mikhail. Rabelais and His World. Translated by Hélène Iswolsky. Indiana University Press, 1984.
3. Bennett, Jane. Vibrant Matter: A Political Ecology of Things. Duke University Press, 2010.
4. Buchan, Suzanne. “Bruno Schulz’s ‘Generatio aequivoca’: Sites of (Dis-)Enchantment in the Quay Brothers’ Street of Crocodiles.” In Anti-Tales: The Uses of Disenchantment, edited by Catriona McAra and David Calvin, 84–97. Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2011.
5. Buchan, Suzanne. The Quay Brothers: Into a Metaphysical Playroom. University of Minnesota Press, 2011.
6. Ficowski, Jerzy. Regions of the Great Heresy: Bruno Schulz, A Biographical Portrait. Translated by Theodosia Robertson. W. W. Norton, 2003.
7. Fiedorczuk, Julia. “Thing Power – Brunona Schulza miłość do materii jako takiej.” In Schulz. Przewodnik Krytyki Politycznej, edited by Agata Bielik-Robson and Jakub Majmurek, 54–67. Wydawnictwo Krytyki Politycznej, 2013.
8. Jarzębski, Jerzy. “Schulz the Universal.” Translated by Marta Kurek. Schulz/Forum, Special Issue: Interpretations and Discoveries (2024): 73–82.

9. Jarzębski, Jerzy. “Wstęp.” In Bruno Schulz, Opowiadania. Wybór esejów i listów, edited by Jerzy Jarzębski, v–cxxiv. 2nd ed. Biblioteka Narodowa I 264. Zakład Narodowy im. Ossolińskich, 1998.
10. Jurkowski, Henryk. “Kantor – w kręgu lalek i manekinów.” Konteksty 69, no. 1–2 (2015): 309–18.
11. Kantor, Tadeusz. A Journey Through Other Spaces: Essays and Manifestos, 1944–1990. Edited and translated by Michal Kobialka. University of California Press, 1993.
12. Kearney, Richard. Touch: Recovering Our Most Vital Sense. Columbia University Press, 2021.
13. Kearney, Richard, and Brian Treanor, eds. Carnal Hermeneutics. Fordham University Press, 2015.
14. Kristeva, Julia. Powers of Horror: An Essay on Abjection. Translated by Leon S. Roudiez. Columbia University Press, 1982.
15. Kristeva, Julia. Revolution in Poetic Language. Translated by Margaret Waller. Columbia University Press, 1984.
16. Markowski, Michał Paweł. Powszechna rozwiązłość. Schulz, egzystencja, literatura. Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Jagiellońskiego, 2012.
17. Merleau-Ponty, Maurice. The Visible and the Invisible. Translated by Alphonso Lingis. Northwestern University Press, 1968.
18. Nalewajk, Żaneta. W stronę perspektywizmu. Problematyka cielesności w prozie Brunona Schulza i Witolda Gombrowicza. słowo/obraz terytoria, 2010.
19. Naróg, Aleksandra. “Schulzowskie obrazy wstrętu – Karakony.” Schulz/Forum, no. 12 (2018): 101–14.
20. Orzeszek, Jakub. “Schulz and Mourning: About the Writer’s Second Body.” Schulz/Forum, Special Issue: Identities and Biographies (2023): 227–44.
21. Panas, Władysław. Księga blasku. Traktat o kabale w prozie Brunona Schulza. Towarzystwo Naukowe KUL, 1997. Digital edition, Ośrodek “Brama Grodzka – Teatr NN,” 2009. https://biblioteka.teatrnn.pl/dlibra/Content/66970/Ksiega_blasku_Traktat_o_kabale.pdf.
22. Schulz, Bruno. Letters and Drawings of Bruno Schulz, with Selected Prose. Edited by Jerzy Ficowski. Translated by Walter Arndt with Victoria Nelson. Harper & Row, 1988.
23. Schulz, Bruno. Opowiadania. Wybór esejów i listów. Edited by Jerzy Jarzębski. Biblioteka Narodowa I 264. Zakład Narodowy im. Ossolińskich, 1989. 2nd ed., 1998.
24. Schulz, Bruno. Sanatorium pod Klepsydrą. Fundacja Wolne Lektury, n.d. https://wolnelektury.pl/katalog/autor/bruno-schulz/. Based on Bruno Schulz, Sklepy cynamonowe; Sanatorium pod Klepsydrą, edited by Zofia Smyk. Wydawnictwo Dolnośląskie, 1996.
25. Schulz, Bruno. Sklepy cynamonowe. Fundacja Wolne Lektury, n.d. https://wolnelektury.pl/katalog/lektura/schulz-sklepy-cynamonowe/. Based on Bruno Schulz, Sklepy cynamonowe; Sanatorium pod Klepsydrą, edited by Zofia Smyk. Wydawnictwo Dolnośląskie, 1996.
26. Schulz, Bruno. The Street of Crocodiles and Other Stories. Translated by Celina Wieniewska. Penguin, 2008.
27. Shklovsky, Viktor. Theory of Prose. Translated by Benjamin Sher. Dalkey Archive Press, 1990.
28. Stala, Krzysztof. Na marginesach rzeczywistości. O paradoksach przedstawienia w prozie Brunona Schulza. Wydawnictwo IBL, 1995.
29. Taylor, Charles. A Secular Age. Harvard University Press, 2007.