A Distinctive Detective Novel: The Deconstruction of Classic Detective Fiction in Haberci Çocuk Cinayetleri
Merve Esra ÖzgürbüzThis study is a discussion from a postfeminist perspective of the narrative strategies used by Perihan Mağden in the detective novel Haberci Çocuk Cinayetleri. These strategies include allowing the readers to be disturbed and criticizing the sexist nature of the crime genre with its contemporary social structures. At the level of the story, the novel is about a fantasy world where women are exploited as objects of desire, where the man is glorified by his intelligence, and where the child is transformed into a labour force. At a deeper level, by using the form and content elements of classical detective, the ways of creating an identity, the emphasis on rationality, and the realities of language, space, and time are questioned, and the strict prescriptiveness of detective literature, which is defined as formula literature, is deconstructed. Postfeminism reveals the duality structure of the detective genre in that it objects to the reduction of literary techniques to mere repetitive mechanisms and to being presented to the interlocutor in cliché decors. Taking action from here and transforming the schematic fiction of the genre by repeating it, Mağden reveals and deconstructs the hierarchical process, violating the classic genre and expanding the boundaries of the detective.
Kendine Özgü Bir Polisiye Denemesi: Haberci Çocuk Cinayetleri’nde Klasik Polisiye Kurgunun Yapıbozumu
Merve Esra ÖzgürbüzBu çalışmada, Perihan Mağden’in Haberci Çocuk Cinayetleri adlı polisiye romanında okurları rahatsız etmek ve çağdaş sosyal yapılar ile polisiye türünün cinsiyetçi niteliğini eleştirmek için kullandığı anlatı stratejileri postfeminist bakış açısıyla ele alınmaktadır. Hikâye düzeyinde kadınların arzu nesneleri olarak sömürüldüğü, erkeğin zekâsıyla yüceltildiği, çocuğun işgücüne dönüştürüldüğü fantastik bir dünya anlatılmaktadır. Daha derinde ise klasik polisiyenin biçim ve içerik unsurları kullanılarak kimlik yaratma çeşitleri, rasyonalite vurgusu, dil, mekân, zaman gerçeklikleri sorgulanmakta ve formül edebiyatı şeklinde tanımlanan polisiyenin katı kuralcılığı yapıbozuma uğratılmaktadır. Fantastiğe evrilen yersiz ve zamansız kurgusuyla klasik polisiyenin rasyonaliteden beslenen kuralcılığını zayıflatan eser, cinsiyetin sınırlarını genişletme girişimleriyle beraber türün kalıplarını sorgulamaktadır. Postfeminizm; mutlak izlek ve karakter kurgularının vurgulandığı bir yapıda, edebî tekniklerin tekrar eden düzeneklere indirgenip klişe dekorlar halinde muhataba sunulmasına itiraz ederek polisiyenin ikiliklere dayanan yapısını görünür kılar. Buradan aksiyon alan ve türün şematik kurgusunu yineleyerek dönüştüren Mağden, hiyerarşik işleyişi ortaya koyup yapıbozuma uğratarak klasik olanı ihlal eder ve polisiyenin sınırlarını genişletir. Dolayısıyla kaidelere dayanan yapının, tanımlanması mümkün olmayan akışkan bir yazın anlayışıyla yer değiştirmesi; cinsiyet ve cinsel yönelim farklılıklarına alan açar, dışlayan politikaların kucaklayan yaklaşımlara evrilmesini ve bireylerin özgün varoluşlarının vurgulanmasını sağlar. Okuyucuların karşısına tipik bir muamma serüveniyle çıkmayı reddeden yazar, eserini klasik yapıyla diyalog halinde olan ve her ikisi de toplum değiştikçe değişen bir üretim olarak sunar.
This study aims to analyse the novel Haberci Çocuk Cinayetleri, which attempts to reveal the deep gap between the experience of femininity, which has already been fictionalized, and unequal practices such as sexual politics, race, and class discrimination through the detective genre, which is a very strict literary genre. During the analysis the focus is on literature, which is a collaborator of the artificial distinctions between individual and public life in general, the forms of representation depending on the way the social structure functions (Irigaray, 2006, p. 17), and on the detective novel within the scope of sexual politics in particular. Thus, the character representations constructed on the basis of gender and sexuality and the stance of these representations against male domination are questioned in the novel, and these come to life through language. It is possible to follow the dramatic changes in the status of the characters through literature that contains ideological codes, because literature allows us to determine how the phenomenon is perceived; perception affects the direction and speed of the action (Maugue, 2005, p, 478).
This study employs the postfeminist theory and uses detective narratives in detective genre preferring the whodunit?/ whodonit? type of text. The dichotomous setup of the Whodunit is convenient for tracking changes in gender and sexual orientation. In addition, the lack of a comprehensive study on the Haberci Çocuk Cinayetleri is among the criteria in the selection of the book. Both the fact that Mağden’s writing technique is open to changes and the reality that she benefits from postmodern methods provide data suitable for evaluation in terms of the arguments of the study.
The analysis method of the study is that of a post-feminist critique that assumes not only women’s but all grievances, acts with a comparative understanding without targeting the universal, and develops new social criticism paradigms without relying on the traditional foundations of philosophy (Sarup, 2010, p. 219-222). The concept of deconstruction, which is the method of poststructuralist theories and which made feminine language possible (especially that advocated by French feminists and put forward by Jacques Derrida), shows that language is an ideological device with a philosophical approach and is used in text analysis. Intertextuality is among the methods used to reach the deep structure of the text and analyse the discourse.
During a long period of convalescence after illness S. S. Van Dine (Willard Huntington Wright), spurred on by his interest in detective fiction, prepared a list of The Twenty Rules of the Detective Novel, in which he determined the common points of the texts after reading a large collection of detective novels. He created his own detective and wrote texts according to the rules on the list. The dystopic detective novel Haberci Çocuk Cinayetleri, written by Perihan Mağden and first published in 1991, is included in the detective genre, but it does not comply with the rules determined by S. S. Van Dine. The text, which is a parody of traditional detective, leaps away from the strict prescriptiveness of the genre on the positivist level and also on the level of character fiction. It has a plot that supports all established patterns, proof that the species is deconstructed. In this text, all impositions are repelled without adhering to the inadequate theorizing of the detective genre and reducing standards. With its spaceless and timeless fiction that has evolved into the fantastic, the novel weakens the rationality of classic detective stories, questioning the patterns of the genre with its attempts to expand the boundaries of gender. The replacement of the structure is based on the rules of a fluid understanding of literature that cannot be defined. It clears space for differences in gender and sexual orientation, ensures that exclusionary policies evolve into embracing approaches and emphasizes the unique existence of individuals. Refusing to display a typical enigmatic adventure novel to her readers, the author presents her novel as a work that is in dialogue with the classical structure and in which both change as society changes.
