Hacettepe Vniversitesi Edebiyat Fakültesi Dergisi Cilt 16/ Sayı I/ss. 13-27 The Interplay Between Historicism And Textualı ty: Postmodern Hı storı es Doç.Dr. Serpil OPPERMANN hı view of the postmodernist ehallenges to the writing of history, representingthe past has eome to be a thorougIyproblematic issue both in historiographieand literarytheorytoday. Sinee postmodernismhas irrevocably disereditedthe eonventional notion of representationas referenee to empirieal reality, recapturingthe past as some extra-textualsouree of reality in historieal narrativeshasbeeome eontestable. But, as John Zammito says, "everybody is talkinghistoridsmthesedays" (1997: 1).Thereisnowa "historieal"turnsweeping throughthehumanitiesinresponsetothe"linguistieturn"thathasbeendominant over the past 20 years. These two "turns" have eome to open up eonflieting positionsamongthe historiographersand literarytheoristsalike. The problems of critical discourse mostly stem from these contending positions and their eorrespondingdilernmas,namelythetextua1istposition,whieh favors textualist analysis of history on formalist prineiples, and the eontextua1istone whieh privilegesthehistoricityof texts,placingthemin relationto soeiety,eultureand politics. The implieations of this debate can be seen in postmodernistfietion whieh relates to it in signifieant ways due to its problematicreturnto history. Labelled ashistoriographiemetafietionbyLinda Hutcheon,postmodernistfietion is "at onee metafietionaland historiealin its eehoes of the texts and eontextsof thepast"(1989: 3).Thec1ashbetweenthetwo tums manifestsitselfasaninteıplay between historieism and textua1ityin the diseoursesof such fictions. Sinee thehistorietum markstheself-reflexive narrativesofthese fietions, the interrelatedmatrixof textualityand historieityas eonflietingtermsrenders thequestionofhistorytobe intenselyproblematic.Historiographiemetafietions 13