본문 바로가기
  • Home

The Characteristics of a Death in Hyeop-Chang-Ki-Mun(俠娼奇聞)

  • The Research of the Korean Classic
  • 2009, (20), pp.73-107
  • Publisher : The Research Of The Korean Classic
  • Research Area : Humanities > Korean Language and Literature > Korean Literature > Korean classic prose

조혜란 1

1경희대학교

Accredited

ABSTRACT

This paper aims to analyze the features of a death in Hyeop-Chang- Ki-Mun(俠娼奇聞) written by Lee-Ok(李鈺). Hyeop-Chang-Ki-Mun(俠娼奇聞) is the story of a famous gisaeng(妓生: Korean geisha)of the days in Seoul. She committed suicide with a customer of her 'kibang'(妓房 gisaeng's entertaining place) and it gave a great shock to her acquain -tances because he was a man who had fallen suddenly. He had became enmeshed in political matters in 1775(乙亥獄事), so degraded to a male servant at Je-Ju provincial government office. She had followed him to Je-Ju and committed a joint suicide. This story is worthy of notice because it describes a joint suicide, which was very unusual manner of death in the proses of the Joseon Dynasty period. Most of the novels of the days had been dealt with the death within the four corners of Confucian morality. Compared with them, Hyeop-Chang- Ki-Mun dealt with a hedonic and decadent death, in which lovers died from abandoning themselves to sex with hard liquor. It is interesting that the stories in Cheong-Seong-Jap-Ki(淸城雜記)and Yang-Eun-Cheon-Mi(楊隱闡微) are brothers to Hyeop-Chang-Ki-Mun's. This paper draws a comparison among these three stories in terms of the source of stories, guesses a real character and an actual event as a model of these stories and considers the features of Hyeop-Chang-Ki-Mun's narrative. The death in Hyeop-Chang-Ki-Mun is not the result by Confucian morality, and not the result of the thing they can't control. It is a kind of desire, which voluntarily chose a death for being no way out in their lives. Hyeop-Chang-Ki-Mun made a description of the pleasures of the moment, the decadent atmosphere, and the death as a voluntary choice. Lee-Ok regarded the gisaeng's choice as a kind of chivalry. But it is remarkable for her to commit suicide by a desire beyond Confucian morality.

Citation status

* References for papers published after 2023 are currently being built.