연성흠의 아동문학 연구

Abstract

Yeon Seong-Heum’s children’s literary works emphasize the meanings of consideration, sacrifice, and help, which is his viewpoint on time. Yeon Seong-Heum structuralizes his works in the direction to fully show this intention. As the first characteristic, others are handled very importantly as surrounding people of a child subject who delivers the main messages of the work. In the second characteristic, the meaning of the child subject is formed in the viewpoint of surrounding people and others. In the third characteristic, the main character, surrounding people, and situation are objectively described in the viewpoint of observer. Those characteristics fully show the author’s thematic consciousness. In Yeon Seong-Heum’s children’s literary works, the characters of others are more highlighted as surrounding people than the subject of message delivery. The main messages of his works are like ‘Everyone should become a person who is patient without greed, and also empathizes and supports others’. By putting more effort on the creation of surrounding characters than the subject of message delivery, the rightfulness is given to the main character’s action and result. He obtains readers’ consent through the characters of surrounding people. Regarding the values like consideration, solidarity, and help, which is the thematic consciousness inherent in Yeon Seong-Heum’s works, the definition made by the subject is not good enough to secure the true meanings. Such values could be formed only by others’ recognition. As a method to deliver this thematic consciousness, Yeon Seong-Heum captures the moment when a true subject is born in others’ eyes. The viewpoint of observer objectively describes every situation and fairly describes works without concentrating on a specific character. Through this method, the readers could view the subject that has passed others’ eyes, instead of the subject’s position. This method is intentionally chosen by the author to effectively show the thematic consciousness penetrating the work. Yeon Seong-Heum’s children’s literature realizes the value of beings through surrounding people, and also regards the acts helpful for surrounding people as motive power even in difficult and painful reality of the time. Among various children’s literary works of the 1920s~1930s, Yeon Seong-Heum shows his own unique characteristics in his works. It should be considered that Yeon Seong-Heum’s children’s literature is playing an important role in strengthening the basis of Korean modern children’s literature.