René Girard (1923-2015), a French literary critic and member of the Académie Française, has drawn attention especially with his studies in the field of anthropology and anthropological philosophy. In addition to his important contributions to the field of anthropology, Girard also provided a rich conceptual content to literary criticism with the theories he asserted in his works. The theory of "mimetic desire" (triangle of the mimetic desire/ triangular desire), which Girard put forward in his book Romantic Lie and Romanesque Truth, is currently used as a method of analysis in analyzing literary works. Although not as widespread as the "mimetic desire" theory as a method in literary work analysis, Girard's "scapegoat" theory, is new and stands out as an approach quite consistent for literary criticism, which he discussed with all its conceptual aspects in his works titled The Scapegoat, Things Hidden Since the Foundation of the World, and Violence and the Sacred. In this article, Girard's "scapegoat" theory is used as a theoretical approach to analyze the story of Oğuz Atay's Beyaz Mantolu Adam [The Man with the White Coat] in his book Korkuyu Beklerken [Waiting for Fear]. The process of transforming the unnamed hero of the story (the man with the white coat) into a scapegoat that draws the anger of the community/mass is discussed in the axis of the concepts of alienation, estrangement, anti-hero, self-problem and modernism.
Scapegoat, Alienation, Estrangement, Anti-Hero, Self, Modernism.