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The Street and the Library: Palbong and Hoiwol’s Journey Before and After Liberation

  • Journal of Humanities, Seoul National University
  • 2021, 78(3), pp.245-282
  • DOI : 10.17326/jhsnu.78.3.202108.245
  • Publisher : Institute of Humanities, Seoul National University
  • Research Area : Humanities > Other Humanities
  • Received : July 26, 2021
  • Accepted : August 16, 2021
  • Published : August 31, 2021

Son Youkyung 1

1서울대학교

Accredited

ABSTRACT

The purpose of this article is to restructure the activities of ‘Palbong’ Kim Gi-jin and ‘Hoiwol’ Park Yeong-hui after liberation, and to investigate the significance of the different cultural practices sought by the two individuals on the street and in the library in terms of the history of criticism and the history of intelligence. The literature history written by Palbong and Hoiwol, who were both companions and rivals to each other, used to be handled by the standard approach in which their writings were placed at the center of the post-liberation discussion. Breaking free from the conventional approach, this article highlights the aspects of Palbong that were unknown to Hoiwol and those of Hoiwol that were unknown to Palbong in order to derive the prototypical characteristics of the ‘literature-publishing-magazine power’ and the ‘academic criticism free from the literary community’ that were later found in the literary and intellectual circles in Korea. Firstly, Palbong’s unique ‘tycoon complex,’ which stood out from the Period of the Japanese Colonial Rule, was reviewed, focusing on his episodes related to his business management of Aejisa, a publishing company, to show how the complex was distorted after the independence of Korea and the Korean War. Palbong’s agony between art and business was consistently observed from the Period of the Japanese Colonial Rule to the liberation period. The aspiration to stand out as a cultural businessman by using all available human and material resources is not only Palbong’s personal desire but also a feature of the modern mainstream literary circle of Korea. On the other hand, the ‘ivory tower complex’ of Hoiwol, who steadily emphasized the academic criticism free from the literary coterie made him be immersed in intensive writing works before and after liberation, even to the point of publishing a book devoted to literature theory, entitled Theory and Practice of Literature in 1947. Theory and Practice of Literature was a theoretical book that expanded and systemized the essential contents of “New Development and Trend of Recent Literature Theory” (1934), which is known as his declaration of conversion. Being indicted for the publication of the book, Hoiwol was drastically intimidated and withdrew himself farther from the literary, academic and publishing communities. Hoiwol’s consistent academic pursuit of aesthetic exploration of literature may not justify his pro-Japanese activities. However, if his deep-rooted ivory tower complex is left to sink into the black hole of interpretation based on the conversion and the pro-Japanese activities, his heritage of aesthetic theory may be permanently taken away from the literary history of Korea.

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