YURI TRIFONOV’UN MOSKOVA METİNLERİNDE “GENIUS LOCI” (“DEĞİŞİM” ADLI ESERİ ÖRNEĞİNDE)

“GENIUS LOCI” IN THE MOSCOW TEXT OF YURY TRIFONOV (IN THE CASE OF STORY NAMED “THE EXCHANGE”)

Özet

Kente ait her imge kentin kendisini ve belleğini içinde barındırmasının yanında insanlar arasındaki sosyal ilişkiyi de mekânsal olarak görünür kılar. Bu anlamda Eski Roma dininde mekânın koruyucu ruhu olarak nitelendirilen "genius loci", edebi metinlerdeki topografik özelliklerin etkinliğini kahramanlar ve olay örgüsü bağlamında ortaya koyan önemli bir kavramdır. "Mekânın ruhu" olarak Türkçeleştirilen latince ilişkilendirilebilecek bir ruhu olduğu düşünülen kent, canlı bir öze sahiptir. Genius loci mimari, sosyoloji, felsefe, tarih alanlarındaki varlığını kaçınılmaz bir biçimde edebiyatta da duyumsatarak öznel, nesnel ve zamansal öğelerle sarılı modern yaşamın beraberinde getirdiği değişimi hissettirir.Bu anlamda kenti sanatsal bir araştırma objesi olarak ele alan, gündelik yaşamı gözler önüne serme ve gündelik yaşam üzerine düşünme gerekliliği arasında bir uzlaşma yakalamaya çalışan Yuri Valentinoviç Trifonov, sanatıyla XX. yüzyıl Rus edebiyatının ikinci yarısındaki Moskova metinlerinin öncü yazarlarından biri olarak kabul edilir. Yazar, kaleme aldığı Moskova metinlerinde kendi geçmişi ve yarattığı kahramanların geçmişiyle Moskova'yı bütünleştirir. Moskova, Trifonov'un tüm çalışmalarında yalnızca olayların gerçekleştiği bir mekân değil, kahramanların karşılıklı çekim içinde karmaşık ilişkilerde bulunduğu (sanatsal) bir evren modeli oluşturur. Bu çalışmada kenti yalnızca bir sahne, bir imge olarak değil aynı zamanda canlı bir organizma olarak ele alan yazarın kentin ruhunu hissettiren, geçmiş- şimdi eksenli anlatımı "Değişim" (Obmen) adlı eseri örneğinde disiplinlerarası bir yöntemle irdelenecektir.

Abstract

Each image that belongs to the city both hold the city itself together with its memory and makes the social relationship between people visible as part of space. In this sence, the “genius loci” described as the protective spirirt of the space according to the religion of the ancient Rome, is an important notion which reveals the efficiency of topographic characteristics in literary texts as part of heros and plot. According to this notion translated into turkish as “The Spirit of Space”; the city, which is thought to have a spirit that can be associated with its cultural past, has a living entity. With making sense of its presence in architecture, sociology, philosophy, history and also inevitably in literature, genius loci makes understand the change that is accompanied by modern life surrounded with subjective, objective, and temporal elements. In this sence, on account of his artistic talent, Yury Valantinovich Trifonov, who tries to get a concordance between displaying the daily life and the necessity of thinking about it and handle the city as an artistic object of research, is accepted as one of the leading authors of the literary texts of Moscow belonging to the second half of the 20th century Russian literature. The author combines the city Moscow with both his past and the past of his heros whom he has created in his literary works which he has written about Moscow. In all works of Trifonov, Moscow is not only a place where some events have taken place but also an artistic model of space in which the heros have complicated relationships intracting with one another. The expression of author in this work, he not only handles the city as a place or an image but also as a living organism, making the readers feel the spirit of the city and consisting of both the past and the present, will be scrutinized in his work called “The Exchange” benefiting from an interdisciplinary method The architectural historian Christian Norberg-Schulz argues that the thing identified with urban environment is something individuals living in the environment cannot explain directly but are aware of its existence. This assessment which the researcher cannot explain in concrete terms is nourished from “genius loci” expression that is characterized as a protective sprit of space in Ancient Roman religion. Indeed, according to Ancient–Rome belief each free spirit has a genius, in other words a protective sprit. This spirit vivifies people and places. From this aspect, Schulz who advocates that people need to be able to identify themselves with the place where they live to be able exist and hold on to life, creates an elementary model idea for literary texts about places. In this sense, Yury Valentinovich Trifonov (1925-1981) carrying Moscow to a point that he can see and feel with all sprit by touching with his hands and eyes throughout his fifty six year of life span from birth to death sets an example to the subject of place identification. The source of Trifonov’s creativity belongs to Moscow where he feels that he has an unbreakable bond with. Herein, even though the described events, fictions and intensity of the emotions show differences, there is “Moscow” in the soul of his all works except Turkmen stories. The author portrays two different alterations in his story called “The Exchange” which he wrote in 1969. The name alteration given to the story creates a wave of thoughts from concrete to abstract. In one side there are dwelling problem which is caused by urban and social transformation occurring because of urbanization factor that takes place in his nearly all stories mentioned Moscow and daily life trapped between the past and the present and habits and changing, developing Moscow. In other side, there is Viktor Dimitriyev, even whose family members have difficulty to recognize, replacing face to face relationships with informal and coincidental relations, beginning to focus on himself with an individualistic approach and living with the conditions that are easy and comfortable instead of value judgments. Dimitriyev whose mother Kseniya Federovna contracting a serious illness goes to talk with her about moving her into their apartment after his wife Lena’s insistence. According to Lena’s plan, changing their and the old woman’s oneroomed flat with a two-roomed flat after Kseniya Fedorovna’s death will be able to provide them a comfortable life. This work, has a now-past centered plot mentioning Dimitriyev’s departure from his own apartment to Pavlinovo where his mother’s house is located in order to talk with her. Indeed, in a sense Dimitriyev proceeds to his past step by step along the way within a few hours. Feeling the things that he couldn’t realize in those past years, he begins to reason everything himself. All this recollection process is derived by spatial recollection. It is mentioned from the streets of the city that changed over time, from old buildings, old people, lost neighborhood relations, renewed settlements, concreting of the Pavlinovo area where the country houses are located, and this settlement where once elite people reside is filled with all kind of unknown indefinite people. In particular the “Dimitriev” family is narrated however what is really wanted to be described is the “city” which lives the period and part of this change with its “people” experiencing everything there themselves. Going to the country houses in Pavlinovo to talk to her mother, Dimitriyev gets is a return path to the home from darkness to the light like the protagonist’s return from Troya in Odysseia. While Dimitriyev’s darkness can be interpreted as experienced change, his light can be interpreted as awakening thanks to his past and mother’s words. Above all this return to home brings with nostalgia. The awakening of the memories that have already begun on the way to the country house takes Dimitriyev from the moment like in the simile of Bergson’s ‘timbre of a melody’. The yesterday-today story of t