‘신빈곤’에 관한 문학적 서사 - 김애란의 소설집 『침이 고인다』

Abstract

With the establishment of a neo-liberalist market order after the foreign currency crisis in the 1990’s, urban poverty has shown aspects radically different from those of the past. While old poverty was based on material deficiency due to impossibility of economic engagement, new poverty has an inseparable relation with the proliferation of the ‘working poor’who cannot escape from situations of poverty though engaging in economic activities. Also, new poverty is close to relative poverty in which one feels deprivation due to the deepening of the rich-poor gap, and a function of social inequality consisting of economic deprivation, social exclusion, cultural alienation etc. Today, the phenomenon of ‘jobless growth’ gets more prominent though macroeconomic indicators including economic growth rates and investments show recovery trend. In particular, the phenomena of employment crises are serious due to high unemployment rates in young generations and increase of long-term jobless persons. The seriousness of the issue lies in the fact that the young unemployed cannot help leading a life as an alienated class in this society losing stable jobs and hopeful future. Kim Ae-ran’s collection of novels, My Mouth Waters(2007) very intensely shows those problems with our society. This paper tries to discuss her My Mouth Waters as a collection of literary narratives on ‘new poverty.’ The subjects of analysis in this paper include Arrogant Life, My Mouth Waters, Passing the Meridian, Christmas Specials, and Prayer out of the 8 novels contained in the collection. The discussion in this paper is carried out at the three levels, poverty of working, poverty of housing, and poverty of hope, main characteristics of new poverty. In terms of this, this paper sheds light on the fact that problems of poverty, alienated labor, and social exclusion due to them, which are depicted in Kim Ae-ran’s novels, are naturally associated with the aspects of new poverty in our society.