ABSTRACT
Bilge Karasu’s The Garden of Departed Cats and Sema Kaygusuz’ Wine and Gold are works, which, both in terms of their content and experimental form, present an ethical stance that involves the acknowledgement of the irreducible singularity of human and non-human lives, an insight gained by the recognition of the mortality and vulnerability embodied life, which constitutes the focus of both texts. Karasu’s book consists of intersecting stories, all of which present characters who witness and identify with the suffering of an animal. Although an anthropomorphic conception of the predicament of the fellow being, be it a fish, a horse, a porcupine, constitutes the initial stage of the changing self-conception of these nameless characters, all proceed toward a sense of subjectivity, which cannot be conceptualized by the categories of human language due to its plurality and affective relationality. This chapter will focus on the healing effects of nature and narratives, almost as reminiscent of a shamanic past that is also evoked by the two works that emphasize the bond and interdependence between human and non-human forms of life, as well as the sky, the sea, and the earth as sacred source of life. It will also discuss the structure and stylistic elements of both works in terms of the ways in which they accentuate an idea of subjectivity whose singularity resides in its plurality.
