Esra Dicle, Edebiyatın Duygu Haritası [The Emotional Map of Literature] (İstanbul: Dergâh Yayınları, 2022)

Abstract

This article examines a book titled Edebiyatın Duygu Haritasi [The Emotional Map of Literature], prepared by Esra Dicle. The book explores the potential contributions that the field of literary criticism can make to the study of emotions. It questions the dominance of reason, challenges accepted notions about humans and their relationships as the measure of all things, and examines emotions through the lens of both human and non-human actors, resulting in a cartography of emotions. The work delves into what emotions express and how they are perceived by the authors whose writings are included in this study, focusing on questions like what emotions communicate and how they relate to the collective "(us)," thereby examining the dominance of societal gender norms, binary concepts such as male-female, emotion-reason, and the matrices of capitalism through various relational networks. Thus, in this article, the central theme of the book, "emotions," is described within the context of literary criticism as a "homecoming," utilizing the opportunities presented by the field.