한일 아동문학의 판타지 시공간 비교 연구 -이원수의《숲 속 나라》, 사토 사토루의《아무도 모르는 작은 나라》

Abstract

Both <Country in the woods> by WonSoo, Lee and <Small country which no one knows> by Sato Satoru are considered as important works in children’s literature history in Korea and Japan, and particularly, they are recognized as the first fantasy literature. In <Country in the woods>, view for writing children’s story and perception of reality of WonSoo, Lee are well shown and it is based on such political imagination. Though it is said that characteristic of fantasy is damaged due to strong metaphor and the weight of symbols, is seems to obtain good results in the way that it shows an urgent problem at that time in 1949, establishment of independent country through fantasy. <Small country which no one knows> is also an important literary work which can be said to achieve the establishment of ‘modern children’s literature’ in Japanese children’s literature history, and is recognized with the meaning in the way that it pursue implicit value of democracy in postwar period which did not progress in children’s literature. In this paper, I examined the historical context where each work was written and characteristics of fantasy time-space in order to compare those two works which have been discussed importantlyboth in Korea and Japan. While <Country in the woods> used pursuit of utopia which cannot be achieved in the real world as a composition principle of fantasy world, <Small country which no one knows> aimed to restore the world of myth where people and Korobokuru coexist with each other peacefully. Because the differences of composition principles of fantasy time-space influenceon the establishing method of those two world, ‘country in the woods’ is connected to the outer world and shows aspect of openness, while ‘country of Korobokuru’ keeps closing status even after restoring the relationship with people. The differences of fantasy time-space in two works are connected to the main characters. The reason why Noma, a main character in <Country in the woods> doesn’t have an active characteristic is that establishment of ‘the country in the woods’ is still in progress. Because ‘country in the woods’ has the same meaning as ideology or value which have to expand to outer world, Noma exists with other friends and provides support to the establishment of ‘country in the woods’. On the contrary, ‘I’, the main character in <Small country which no one knows> plays a leading role in constructing a country of Korobokuru after establishing relations with Korobokuru, and also plays a father-like role rather than makes an equal relation with Korobokuru. The reason why aspects of ‘establishment of a country’ shown in two works is presented differently seems that they partly reflect the political and social situations in Korea and Japan at that time. While an urgent problem in Korea is to establish a proper democratic country in 1949, a problemin Japan is to establish democracy in postwar period in 1959. Though <Country in the woods> and <Small country which no one knows> have their own limitations, they certainly contribute to children’s literature in either Korea or Japan in that they show political imagination through fantasy story and suggest new possibility of children’s literature. Today, fantasy is considered as an important sub-genre of general literature as well as in children’s literature. Surely, ‘fantasy’ is a literary characteristic which crosses the borderline between children’s literature and general literature, and moreover, it is said that the importance of fantasy is bigger in children’s literature. <Country in the woods> and <Small country which no one knows> have its meaning as fantasy literary works which play an important role in establishing children’s literature history in Korea and Japan, and they can have values in that they give implications for social function of children’s literature. In that sense, we should bear in mind that fantasy can be a new alternative of realism in children’s literature.