시조의 정체성과 현대시조가 나아갈 길

Abstract

Sijos is a traditional Korean poem. The purpose of this article is to clarify the differences between ancient Korean sijos and modern Korean ones, and between modern Korean sijos and free verses, and seek the direction for modern Korean sijos to coexist with free verses while finding the way for modern Korean sijos to go. The results of the foregoing efforts are summarized as follows. First, there exists a fundamental difference in the formats of presentation between ancient Korean sijos and modern Korean ones. Whereas ancient Korean sijos are implemented in the musical structure of song chang or sijo chang, modern Korean sijos are implemented based on the inner order of language regardless of music. Second, the two types of sijos are different in their forms. The most primary difference is in the principles of meters. Modern Korean sijos are given the a priori principle of meters termed three verses, six phrases, and 12 metres. On the contrary, free verses are given no principle whatsoever in advance and only the freedom according to the breath of the poet is given as ex post facto necessity. Third, ancient Korean sijos have ‘formal frames’, which are; completing the poetic concept with three verses that form syntax semantic links, composing each verse with four metres (syllable nodes), and creating a change for the transition of the poetic concept by making the first node of the last verse into three syllables and the second node into at least two syntactic words. Such ‘formal frames’ contain the beauty of a high level of modesty, the beauty of peaceful lengthiness, the beauty of stable balance, the beauty of temperate breakaway, and the beauty of flawless plainness and this is the identity of ancient Korean sijos. Since modern Korean sijos are a genre based on the ambilaterality of ‘the property of sijos’ and ‘modernity’, they have a task to contain ‘modernity’ in ‘the property of sijos’, which is three verses, six phrases, and 12 metres because they can secure the status and identity of modern Korean sijos only by doing so. Fourth, modern Korean sijos and free verses should not go toward postmodernism together, but should establish their directions to form a ‘complementary relationship’ so that they satisfy the poetic needs that cannot be fulfilled by each other. The roles of free verses and modern Korean sijos should be divided so that avant-garde, free, and abstruse emotional needs are satisfied by free verses and the needs for stable and tranquil order are satisfied by modern Korean sijos thereby satisfying each others needs for mutual coexistence. Fifth, the way for modern Korean sijos to go in the high-tech age is to make the refined and temperate ‘short sijo’ completed with three verses, six phrases, and 12 metres neatly escape from the triteness coming from the reckless freedom, being in distress, and weird destruction of meters of free verses. The short sijo, which is completed with three verses, six phrases, and 12 metres should be the alternative to heal the reckless morbid pathos of free verses with the neat and balanced ethos of sijos.