20세기 초 여성 지식인의 시각으로 본 서울 공간과 그 의미 - 최송설당의 『松雪堂集』을 중심으로

Abstract

This paper aims to examine the space and the meaning of Seoul from the perspective of female intellectual focused on songseoldangjip(松雪堂集) of Choi Songseoldang(1855～1939) in the period to modern era. Songseoldang was active for rebuilding the family fortunes and Korea under Japanese Rule living in Seoul during the modern transitional period. She tried to overcome the national crisis by understanding the rapidly changing circumstances and acting in society such as educational works. And also she collected works given by coworkers as well as her own, Chinese poems and poetry, etc., and published a collection of works in her life. She did it in the 20th century. It could be said she is a modern woman writer who kept Joseon alive. This study noticed that Songseoldang came up to the capital to rebuild the family fortunes and participated in social activities with living in Seoul even after leaving the palace. And it tried to examine how she recognized Seoul as a female intellectual at the turning periods to modern times in her works. Considering her life, Seoul was the space to achieve the goal of restoring the family fortunes for her, and to set the goal of working in society with making her recognize the rapidly changing circumstances caused by the Western invasions and Japanese aggression after achieving the goal. Also for Songseoldang, Seoul was the capital of the colony and a place to remind him of the situation of a country in crisis. Thus, this study tried to examine how she recognized Seoul as a female intellectual then through Songseoldang’s works collected in her collection series. The reasons for examining how female intellectuals perceive the outside world, focusing on Song Seoldang's collections of literature, are as follows. Until the late Joseon Dynasty, the activities of female intellectuals were generally limited to the inside of the confines. For this reason, they tried to overcome the limitations of being a woman in researching studies or perceiving the outside world. However, when Songseoldang was active, the scope of women's activities was expanded beyond the confines of the realm. Moreover it searched the changing phases of the way in which a female intellectual look at the world out of women’s quarters.