『어우야담』속 바다 형상 - 상상과 현실의 넘나듦

Abstract

This paper examines the shape of the sea seen in Euwooyadam and examines its meaning. Euwooyadam is a work that is mostly based on facts but crosses fiction. The perception of the sea from the distant past to the time when Yu Mong-in lived is accumulated in multiple layers so that we can examine one aspect of pre-modern people's perception of the sea through this. Records related to the sea in Euwooyadam can be roughly divided into three categories. If the sea is used as a background, if the sea itself is an object of interest, or if it is a record of objects related to the sea. Next, through this, the layers of sea perception could also be divided into three. The first is to recognize the sea as a world of the unknown and God, second, to recognize it as an object of experience and inquiry, and third, to recognize it as a space for creating goods and profits. Although the three layers of perception appear in a mixed form rather than exist exclusively, a change in the perception of the sea is also detected from a macroscopic point of view. In other words, the sea was gradually changing from the world of the unknown and the gods into a real and concrete object of recognition and a living space in pursuit of profit. In this way, it can be said that the force driving the change from the world of God to the real space is none other than human intellectual curiosity and desire.