Pelkės fenomenologija : Pelkė Jolitos Skablauskaitės ir Silvijos Plath kūriniuose

LTPelkė tampa kontekstine sandūra, žyminčia XX a. šeštojo dešimtmečio rašytojos Silvijos Plath apsakymo "Panika pagal Džoną ir sapnų biblija" ir šiuolaikinės lietuvių autorės Jolitos Skablauskaitės apysakos "Liūnsargių moteris" fenomenologinius ryšius. Abiejuose apsakymuose pelkė vaizduojama kaip metaforizuota erdvė, konfliktuojanti su erdvės kaip dominuojančios ideologijos pripažintos socialinės terpės sąvoka. Silvijos Plath apsakyme pelkė - anti-sociumo bendrąja prasme signifikantas - įkūnija visa, ką draudžia ar slepia kultūra: tai visuomenės, kurią dominuojanti ideologija teigia esančią sterilią ir pilnavertę, socialinės represijos sankaupa. Jolitos Skablauskaitės veikėjai pelkė yra atskaitos taškas, sudėtingose tapatybės paieškos trajektorijose padedantis įvertinti gamtos ir kultūros dėmenis. Atsižvelgiant į kvazisiurrealistinį nagrinėjamų naratyvų pobūdį, kuriuose dažnai pranyksta riba tarp sapno/vaizduotės ir realybės, galima teigti, jog juose persipina sapno konotacijų spektrui būdinga pelkės simbolika, t.y. nesuvokiamumo, paslapties problematika2 ir sociokultūrine signifikacija paženklintos prasmės. Ekokritinis žvilgnis į šias prasmes išryškina, jog į pelkės - integralios gamtos dalies - simboliką projektuojamas ryšys tarp personažų kaip socialinės terpės subjektų ir jų aplinkos. [Iš straipsnio, p. 48]Reikšminiai žodžiai: Literatūra; Užsienio literatūra; Grožinė literatūra; Rašytojai; Moterys; Jolita Skablauskaitė; Silvija Plath; Kūryba; Gamta; Pelkės; Metaforos; Ekokritika; Jungtinės Amerikos Valstijos (United States of America; JAV; USA); Lithuanian literature; Foreign literature; Fiction; Writers; Women; Jolita Skablauskaitė; Sylvia Plath; Creation; Nature; Swamps; Metaphors; Ecocriticism; Lithuania; United States of America.

ENThe paper examines the significations attached to the quagmire in Sylvia Plaths, an American writers (1932-1963) story "Johnny Panic and the Bible of Dreams" and Jolita Skablauskaite's (b. 1950), a Lithuanian writer's "The Quagmire Woman." The discussion highlights that these quasi-surreal narratives though seem to be focused on the representation of individual psychic states foreground the interplay of social determinants that affect the relationship between humans and the environment. In Sylvia Plaths text, the representation of this relationship as unclear water, apart from psychoanalytical significations, epitomizes an inevitable link between the destabilized socio/eco systems and the destabilized or "toxic consciousness". One reason for the destabilization that emerges directly out of such an anthropomorphic treatment of water in the story is a critique of the hierarchical treatment of nature and culture. Jolita Skablauskaite's "The Quagmire Woman," with its emphasis on the gendered perception of space projected on aquatic symbolism, provides a locus for the investigation of the female protagonist's self-identification within nature/culture dualism and probing into the meanings of the natural. The emphasis on a polarized perception of space highlights the controlling power of dominant forces. Viewed from the perspective of ecofeminism, in its broadest sense, what makes the comparison of Plaths and Skablauskaite's texts meaningful is the manner in which each reveals environmental, gender and social sensitivity by exposing and criticizing tropes that reflect the multifarious aspects of interaction between nature and culture.The discussion of "Johnny Panic and the Bible of Dreams" by Sylvia Plath and "The Quagmire Woman" by Jolita Skablauskaite, in light of ecocritical tenets, aims to bring fresh hues of reflection to texts in which, to borrow Kathleen R Wallaces and Karla Armbruster's phrasing, "nature is less than obvious, texts from the point of view of diverse populations with alternative perspectives on nature and human relationships to it". This approach, especially to Sylvia Plaths text, may be regarded as contradicting the prevailing critical views on Plaths writing, which by the majority of critics is considered to be focused on the self. The vast scholarship on Plath considers "Johnny Panic and the Bible of Dreams" a fictional introspection that delineates a creative woman's angst, stemming from ambiguities of self-perception caused by the inability to fit into society and uphold its norms. The main character, a young woman, Sally, is "Assistant to the Secretary" in an outpatient department of a psychiatric clinic. In contrast to the doctors' rational normative and unavoidably separatist attitude to the psychiatric patients' dreams, Sally envisions herself as part of the "one great brotherhood of the dreamers". For the protagonist, these ties intersect in the manifold semantic paradigm of the aquatic. To elucidate Plaths emphasis on the interconnected of the living and the non-living or subjects and things, Charlene Spretnak's argument proves especially pertinent. Spretnak criticizes the prevailing postmodern (patriarchal) discourses for their emphasis on logic/individuality and undermining of matter/nature/connectedness: "Because the self is believed to be discontinuous from other humans and the rest of the natural world, moral progress is possible via a progression away from personal feelings to abstract, universalized reason".Spretnak's approach, apart from ecological concerns, illuminates on the dimension of gender to highlight that the subjugation of women is inseparable from the domination of nature. This "results in strong opposition between care and concern for particular others (the 'feminine', private realm) and generalized moral concern (the 'masculine', public realm)". Jolita Skablauskaite's "The Quagmire Woman" reflects a different set of interrelationships. With its emphasis on the gendered perception of space that is projected onto aquatic symbolism, it provides a locus for investigating the link between natural and social relations including a consideration of, what Sherman Paul has called, "aesthetic/moral matters". An impression forms that the world of the protagonist, Brigita, is split into strict dichotomies of nature/ culture, country/city, good/evil, and male/female. She lives in a quagmire, a spot of pristine nature that serves as a locus of identification of the female protagonist's identity. Irrespective of the holistic connectedness with the natural world, Brigita must leave the quagmire. The reason is not very clear, but the most important reason for withdrawing would probably be the processes of identity transformation reverberating from an awakened consciousness, which is related, the same as in the story by Plath, by the symbolism of a swamp. Brigita, a child of nature, the wild albeit unrealized embodiment of eros awaits, like some passive fairytale heroine, her savior prince, who happens to be a widowed scholar - the classical logos symbol. The alliance between logos and eros or the creation of personal harmony is substantiated by the rejection/refutal of nature/the natural and the crossing over into the sphere of town/culture. In a somewhat gothic manner, Brigita is imprisoned in a closed space which, in Skablauskaite story is a house in town. [From the publication]