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history that she personally had contributed forming could not have been what she saw in the future
of the country. Halide, while saying, “Freedom, freedom is such a thing! (…) It had to be deserved
everyday. Fight for freedom never ends.” 7 starts to take off her clothes slowly, she wants to be
liberated from her slavery in the history, at the end of her experience of settling the accounts, which
lasted all play long, she is now a free, brave woman, free from her clothes, her body is apparent, she
is naked on the stage and she seems helpless but she is challenging the history.
Third biographical play by Erenus, Güneyli Bayan‐ Southern Lady takes place in the United States
in 1950’s, during the anti‐communist witch‐hunt period of McCarthy and is about what Lillian
Hellman lived. It reveals the contradictions of the period. The play emphasizes the struggling
personality, intellectual standing and identity of Lillian Hellman. Lillian Hellman was investigated and
called for a hearing because of her writings and political plays by The House Committee on Un‐
American Activities. Although she was very much afraid, she did not give up her ethical values and
beliefs during the hearing. Hellman’s book Scoundrel Time is about this period and what she lived
during those days and is the originating point of Erenus’s play. The contradictions that Hellman lived
before the hearing, betrayals that she faced during hearings, her loosing her job afterwards and
those difficult days are narrated in the play. Also, Hellman’s relation with her lover Dashiell Hammett
is at the center of the plot. Although Dashiell tries to persuade her to give up, Lillian says “This time I
have to follow my own path” 8 and demonstrates a decided attitude.
The play creates a timeless space between flashbacks and now. Hellman remembers everything
she lived, while she is writing her notebook of memoirs, what she writes is being acted. People who
are a part of Hellman’s life are impersonated by a figure called Human and play continues in the form
of “play within a play”. In this play Erenus is totally loyal to Hellman’s memoirs; she did not write any
fictious scenes that is the product of her imagination. In a period when society is hold under pressure
and fear, is forced to silence and subduing, Lillian is brave enough to say “They want to scare the hell
out of the Nation. A person who is afraid can not think. They are aiming to create people who can not
think!” 9 and she adds: “There is no such a thing written on my tiny notebook of morals as saving
yourself by attacking on people who are in trouble.” 10 At the end of the play Lillian Hellman who
succeeds in controlling all her fears goes to the committee, during the hearing despite all of the
oppressive and subduing policies of the committee, she wears a decided attitude and does not
mention any names. In the play Lillian says: “This has always been like this, in every age. There is
always a need for a theme to confuse the illiterate people’s minds and anti‐communism theme is as
such.” 11 Play has a contemporary discourse. On this contemporary discourse, Erenus says: “[the play]
can be performed anywhere on the world, any time. I wish there would not be a need for it.” 12 We
can say that in the play, Erenus reminds her audience that being a human, being able to stand still
needs being able to deal with one’s fears. Without creating any heroines, Erenus underlines that selfrespect
is more important then any material advantage. When she was composing the play, Erenus
writes on her dairy: “With all her contradictions, the original voice of resistance of an intellectual
without any organizational connections excites me more than a believing and a decided heroine.” 13
We can see that in Erenus’s play, she portrays Lillian Hellman on stage, as an intellectual woman who
does not have any political, organizational attachments with communist parties, who stands strong in
hearings because of her personal understanding of ethics and who dares to give up her own freedom
in order not to give any harm to other people. At the beginning of the play, Erenus portrays Hellman
as a weak figure who does not know what to do; as the play proceeds she builds her up into a
Hellman who is getting stronger against the events she lived through and this is reflected
symbolically. At the beginning of the play Hellman tries to whistle but can not succeed, but at the
end she learns to whistle.
These biographical plays by Bilgesu Erenus, in which we witness, strong, intellectual women of
literature are reconsidering the past and are trying to be liberated from the slavery of the history, are