고소설 『소대성전』 원본 추적과 그 의의

Abstract

The author or the date of composition cannot be affirmed for any of the classic hangeul fi ction. Th ere are, furthermore, many variants of each text, and organizing them to determine their lineage and to identify the original manuscript is an extremely diffi cult task. Given such signifi cant challenges, it may seem impossible to come up with a proper narrative of the history of classic hangeul fiction. Although a number of works on the history of classic fiction have appeared since the 1930s, most of their contents are of questionable accuracy. In addition, almost all information on the subject that has appeared in countless works of Korean history and Korean cultural history is of unreliable nature. In the case of ‘Th e Story of So Daeseong,’ there is clear indication of its readership in the late eighteenth century, and is extant today in many variants. In this article, I propose a method for determining the original manuscript among the numerous variants of a given work, using ‘Th e Story of So Daeseong’ to demonstrate it. It will provide aid in the determination of the time of composition and the original manuscript for works similar in form and content as ‘Th e Story of So Daeseong’. Once this research method is used to yield signifi cant results in the fi eld, it will become possible to come up with a reliable account of the history of classic Korean fi ction.