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The diversity of the Korean New Novel by accepting Japanese Political Novels- Comparing Koo Yeon-hak’s Seoljoongmae with Suehiro tetcho’s Setchubai

노연숙 1

1서울대학교

Accredited

ABSTRACT

This thesis is to compare the difference of Suehiro tetcho’s Setchubai( ฀฀雪 中梅฀฀) and its adapted version, Koo Yeon-hak’s Seoljoongmae( ฀฀설중매฀฀) and to reexamine the characteristics of the latter. Setchubai, the original text is one of the Japnanese Three Political Novels including Kajin no kigu( ฀฀가 인지기우฀฀) and Keikoku bidan( ฀฀經國美談฀฀). Especially, Setchubai kept up with Jiyu minken undo(the movement for the protection of civil rights in Japan). The statement that there was a Setchubai’s era in the Japanese political history is still valid because there was actually the era that Literature and Politics were naturally combined. This inevitability was demanded in the other oriental countries: China, Korea. Setchubai was adapted in China in 1903 and in Korea in 1908. In China at that time, the political narrative was high-positioned thanks to Liang Chitsao’s assertion of the usefulness of novels. On the other hand, in Korea, a novel was regarded as a guide to the civilization or an enlightenment text, not the political narrative. The adapted version, Seoljoongmae had a name of ‘a political novel’. It was one of the Korean Three Political Novels including Yi In-jik’s Eunsegae (฀฀은세계฀฀: the Silver World) and Yi Hae-jo’s Jayoojong(฀฀자유종฀฀: the Freedom Bell). Especially, Seoljoonmae has a story that the hero performs political actions while the other two don’t. As it were, Seoljoongmae is a political narrative that reflects the Korean political realities at that time rather than the New Novel that has an insignificant politics or the political novel that is deformed and imperfect. Because Koo Yeon-hak’s Seoljoongmae brought a hero who was to perform the political actions in 1890’s situation when Dongnip hyupoe(독립협회: the Independence Association) was leading various activities positively. In this work, the hero and the heroine want to reach to the ideal nation beyond the happy home. Seoljoongmae shows that it’s the most important to get the spouse with whom they can take part in accomplishing the national business. The love narrative accepts the modern politics and thus it is transformed into the political narrative where the marriage means the coupling with the spouse who can develop the national business. The adaption, Seoljoongmae has the same story and plot of the original, Setchubai. In addition, the marriage in these work has the same meaning as it represents the attainment of the ideal politics though the former didn’t show it as definitely as the latter. This difference made the emergence of the Korean political narrative possible because Koo Yeon-hak, the writer of Seoljoongmae accepted the political realities in Korea while adapting Suehiro tetcho’s Setchubai.

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