ABSTRACT
Viral and bacterial agents point to vibrant ecologies in their co-evolution with other living matter, forming hybrid configurations. Simply put, they illustrate an example of post-human, post-natural, and post-life survival. Drawing on studies in material ecocriticism, this chapter rethinks the disease-carrying micro-agents as storied matter in cooperation with human stories, whose assemblage of narrative capacity unfolds in what Donna Haraway calls ‘multispecies storytelling.’ In such narratives, viruses and bacteria exhibit their agentic powers, transforming urban life from a centre of power and consumption into a centre for fear and desolation. The porosity of bodies and the intra-dependence of material and discursive practices reveal lethal stories, which generally manifest in chaotic and cataclysmic future scenarios, hence feeding on ecophobic fodder. Therefore, this chapter delves into a historical analysis of epidemics in modern Turkey, starting from Justinian Plague and intermittent contagious diseases in such urban centres as Istanbul, Trabzon, and Diyarbakır to the current outbreak of COVID-19. Tracing historical records in an environmental context, it links the stories of contagious diseases to traditional Turkish miniature painting, as exemplified in the earliest paediatric surgical atlas, Cerrahiye-i İlhaniye (1465), by the surgeon Şerefeddin Sabuncuoğlu. Thus, this chapter expands and enhances material ecocritical theories by incorporating the expressive forces of story-filled agents that have long proved to be co-emergent with Homo sapiens.
