Skip to main navigation menu Skip to main content Skip to site footer
##common.pageHeaderLogo.altText##

Research Article (Off Topic)

No. 5

Critiques by a Dinosaur: Reading Virginia Woolf with Mina Urgan and Erich Auerbach

DOI
https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.8429878
Submitted
4 September 2023
Published
18.10.2023

Abstract

The only monograph on Virginia Woolf in Turkish was written by a woman no less exceptional: writer, activist, and academic Mina Urgan (1915-2000). The monograph provides clues regarding Urgan’s thoughts on gender, mental stability, and what makes good writing; it also includes a note on antisemitism, and a nod to her teacher, one of the many German Jewish refugees who taught at Turkish universities during the Nazi regime, and one of the founders of comparative literature as a discipline, Erich Auerbach. Taking the relationality of identity as its departure point, this article suggests a dialogue between three writers, and between life writing and critique. Articulating context to critique, the comparisons in this article suggest new networks of meaning through the transnational connections of literary criticism in Turkey.

References

  1. Adak, Hülya. “National Myths and Self-Na(rra)tions: Mustafa Kemal’s Nutuk and Halide Edip’s Memoirs and The Turkish Ordeal.” The South Atlantic Quarterly, no. 102 (Spring/Summer 2003).
  2. Aksoy, Nazan. Kurgulanmış Benlikler: Otobiyografi, Kadın, Cumhuriyet. İstanbul: İletişim Yayınları, 2009.
  3. Apter, Emily. The Translation Zone: A New Comparative Literature. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2006.
  4. Arendt, Hannah. “Collective Responsibility.” In Arnor Mundi: Explorations in the Faith and Thought of Hannah Arendt. Edited by J. W Bernauer. Dordrecht: Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, 1987.
  5. Atasü, Erendiz. Benim Yazarlarım. Ankara: Bilgi Yayınevi, 2000.
  6. Auerbach, Erich. Mimesis: The Representation of Reality in Western Literature. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2003
  7. Çeri, Bahriye. Böyle Bir Hayat: Güzin Dino. İstanbul: Yapı Kredi Yayınları, 1991.
  8. Damrosch, David. “Auerbach in Exile.” Comparative Literature 47, no. 2 (1995): 97-117.
  9. Damrosch, David. What Is World Literature?. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2003.
  10. Emre, Merve. Introduction to The Annotated Mrs. Dalloway, by Virginia Woolf, edited by Merve Emre, i-ixxiv. London: Penguin, 2022.
  11. Glendinning, Victoria. Leonard Woolf: a Biography. Berkeley. CA: Counterpoint: 2008.
  12. Johnston, Georgia. “Virginia Woolf's Talk on the Dreadnought Hoax.” Woolf Studies Annual 15 (2009): 1-7, 9-45.
  13. Lee, Hermione. Virginia Woolf. London: Vintage, 1996.
  14. Lejeune, Philippe. Le Pacte Autobiographique. Paris: Le Seuil, 1975.
  15. Konuk, Kader. East, West, Mimesis: Auerbach in Turkey. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2010.
  16. Lionnet, Françoise. Autobiographical Voices: Race, Gender, Self-Portraiture. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1989.
  17. Marcus, Linda. Auto/biographical Discourses: Theory, Criticism, Practice. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1994.
  18. Mufti, Aamir R. “Auerbach in Istanbul: Edward Said, Secular Criticism, and the Question of Minority Culture.” Critical Inquiry 25 (1998): 95–125.
  19. Özyürek, Esra. Nostalgia for the Modern: State Secularism and Everyday Politics in Turkey. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2006.
  20. Pratt, Mary Louise. Imperial Eyes: Travel Writing and Transculturation. London: Routledge, 1992.
  21. Richards, Earl Jeffrey. “Erich Auerbach's "Mimesis" as a Meditation on the Shoah.” German Politics & Society. Vol. 19. No. 2 (59) (Summer 2001): 62-91.
  22. Rosenbaum, S. P. “Old Bloomsbury.” In The Bloomsbury Group Memoir Club, edited by James M. Haule, 151-153. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014.
  23. Said, Edward. The World, the Text, and the Critic. London: Faber, 1984.
  24. Seyhan, Azade. “German Academic Exiles in Istanbul: Translation as the Bildung of the Other.” In Nation, Language, and the Ethics of Translation, edited by Sandra Berman and Michael Wood, 274-288. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2005.
  25. Snaith, Anna. Virginia Woolf: Public and Private Negotiations. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2000.
  26. Urgan, Mîna. Virginia Woolf. İstanbul: Yapı Kredi Yayınları, 1995.
  27. Urgan, Mîna. İngiliz Edebiyatı Tarihi, İstanbul: Yapı Kredi Yayınları, 1996.
  28. Urgan, Mina. Bir Dinozorun Anıları. İstanbul: Yapı Kredi Yayınları, 1997.
  29. Urgan, Mina. Bir Dinozorun Gezileri. İstanbul: Yapı Kredi Yayınları, 1999.
  30. Vialon, Martin. Yabanın Tuzlu Ekmeği: Erich Auerbach’tan Seçme Yazılar. Çeviren Sezgi Durgun, Haluk Barışcan, Cevdet Perin ve Fikret Elpe. İstanbul: Metis Yayınları, 2010.
  31. Woolf, Virginia. “Diaries 30 August 1923.” In Woolf on Writing Mrs. Dalloway (from A Writer's Diary). Erişim 14 Temmuz 2023, https://www.ndsu.edu/pubweb/~cinichol/252/WoolfDiaryEntryonDalloway.htm.
  32. Woolf, Virginia. Moments of Being: Autobiographical Writings. Edited by Jeanne Schulkind. London: Pimlico, 2002.
  33. Woolf, Virginia. Three Guineas. London: Penguin Books, 2000.
  34. Woolf, Virginia. To the Lighthouse. London: Penguin Books, 2019.
  35. Yapı Kredi Yayınları. “Bir Dinozorun Anıları.” Erişim 14 Temmuz 2023. https://www.yapikrediyayinlari.com.tr/bir-dinozorun-gezileri.aspx.