조선후기 열녀전 읽기

Abstract

In late Joseon Period, the life and death of virtuous women had reported by gentry males. In the sense that the life and death of women have not been recorded by women’s language, it is difficult to embrace the category of women literature. Nonetheless the life and death of women in the biographies of virtuous woman cannot be regarded a falsehood. If it can be separated from the desire of manhood in the patriarchy, the story of virtuous woman is able to be interpreted as a woman literature. A heroic virtuous woman in late Joseon Period was Hyangrang. Many male intellectuals had written Hyangrang’s story. Initially they tended to emphasize the authenticity of Hyangrang’s virtuous death, but gradually embroider her story a romantic affair by the elimination of the truth. The story of Hyangrang colored by romantic moods remained a tragical fiction through ornamentations of fabrication. As a romantic woman of virtue, the aspect was the effect of masculine desire’s projection. Male intellectuals praised virtuous women’s death. But the dead woman of virtue never be able to raise their children or to enshrine their parents. Thus male intellectuals in late Joseon period made an image of the virtuous woman of life. This is an elimination of the virtuous woman’s death for masculine desire. In addition male intellectuals hope women’s fidelity. It’s like virtuous women’s enduring hardships for her husband’s funeral. The story of virtuous women in late Joseon Period is a text of the feminine reality coexistenced with masculine desire.