8.15 해방과 ‘노라’ 이야기 - 최의순의 「노랭이집」, 정비석의 「안해의 항의문」을 중심으로

Abstract

This thesis aims to examine ‘Nora’ narratives after the 8.15 liberation through <A Miser's House>(1946) by Choi Eui-soon and <A Wife's Protest>(1948) by Jung Bi-seok. Nora was the symbol of women's liberation in the 1920s, and she again appeared in literature after national liberation. These two novels had something in common. Both were based on <A Doll's House> by Ibsen and were written in an epistolary style, and juxtaposed national liberation and the escape of a wife. Chapter 2 looked into <A Miser's House>. In this novel, the process that the father who wasn't masculine enough were left out during national foundation and his sons who symbolized the future took his place instead was discussed. And it's also discussed that Nora who were symbolized as a wise mother who raised the fighters for national foundation didn't leave her family mentally though she left her house physically. Chapter 3 looked into <A Wife's Protest> that described a husband who was an anti-nationalist. In this novel, how women's sexual desire was contrasted with mission for national foundation and contemporary ethical consciousness during the era of liberation and how it was described in a negative way were discussed. The author stressed that the wife's leaving home didn't result from her sense of gender equity but was commitment to the nation, and he was wary of the novel's being interpreted as a story of women's liberation. Both of the works described that Nora discarded anti-nationalism, left her house and committed herself to the nation. During the era of liberation, the significance of human liberation emphasized by Ibsen was faded, and a new, Koreanized image of Nora was created as women's liberation was juxtaposed with national liberation. Likewise, the stories of Nora during the period served to reproduce the dichotomy of gender and the way of mobilizing women of the colonial period. The possibility of women's liberation that was presented by the 8·15 liberation was already rooted out in the texts.