프루스트와 간접언어: 주네트의 분석을 중심으로

Abstract

Marcel Proust’s In Search of Lost Time has a special meaning for Gérard Genette, who greatly contributed to establishing modern narratology. His five-volume work, Figures, contains an analysis of Proust’s writing style. The present study attempts to understand the type, role, and effect of indirect language in Proust’s novel by analyzing the chapter, “Proust and Indirect Language,” in the second book of Figures. Proust’s characters, despite revealing much through what they say, reveal much more truth through what they do not say, what they say incorrectly, and the way they say it. On the one hand, Genette refers to the discourses uttered intentionally and directly by the characters as direct language, and on the other hand, he defines as indirect language the signs that reveal the distinct features of the characters in an unintentional and indirect manner. Subsequently, he divides indirect language into two types, the first being linguistic errors, and the second, extralinguistic signs. The reason this work is interesting is that particular characters in Proust’s novels who, through no exaggeration, are defined by their use of language unintentionally reveal hidden aspects through their use of indirect language. By analyzing the indirect language of Proust’s characters, we can understand these characters more in-depth. We can also thereby understand the unrivaled perspective of Genette, who discovers the meaning of existence in Proust’s In search of Lost Time via the indirect language used by its characters that reveals the hidden or intended-to-be-hidden truth.