청소년소설에 나타난 죽음 표상 연구

Abstract

By paying attention to ‘death’, frequently appearing in the Juvenile Novels, this thesis investigated how death is embodied in novel and how the theme is delivered in it. As death is the essential element that defines human nature, it is the existential issue that the adolescents who are forming their identity must agonize and the important incident for them to ruminate the value of life. However, the juvenile novel that targets sensitive young people needs to be careful about the way of embodying suicide or death. First, novels dealing with suicide specifically show échec, various catastrophic situations, such as outcast, discord with their parents and poor grade. By putting as a narrator the agent feeling suicidal to express their scars and pains and their ambivalent desire of death and life, the novels make readers sympathize with the character’s situation. These novels also mostly propose to sincerely introspect suicide, and furthermore, present enlightening themes awakening preciousness of life. These novels console readers and help their emotion purified by giving them the vicarious experience of the pathetic situation. These novels also help young people objectively reflect their circumstances and overcome them. Novels dealing with death of people around adolescents regard introspection and mourning of death importantly. These novels help the adolescent narrator shocked by death of their family or friend find out the meaning of death and do ‘the work of mourning’that normally settle down the loss of the object to the life of the agent. Particularly, novels dealing with other’s death may be seen borrowing the narrative skill of the detective story, in that they arrange ‘the story of death’and ‘the story of investigation’that reveals secrets of the death, to access the truth of death. Maintaining tensions of narration and raising interest in the story, this search process helps readers feel a mental connection with people around them and sincerely reflect death. The material of death appearing in the juvenile novels is expressed as one of the passage rites necessary for them to grow up to manhood. Many juvenile novels describe that young people mourn death through the sense of belong together with people around them and that they overcome the feelings healthily. Although some novels reveal extremely enlightening themes through contrived solution of conflict or conquest of adversity, these novels broaden horizons of possibility of adolescent fiction, by squarely dealing with the matter of death.