할렘 르네상스 소설가들의 탈식민 의식: 진 투머와 넬라 라슨을 중심으로

Abstract

Jaehwan HanThe purpose of this paper is to demonstrate the postcolonial consciousness of the Harlem Renaissance writers with special attention to Jean Toomer and Nella Larsen. Before examining Toomer's Cane (1923) and Larsen's Quicksand (1928) from the perspective of postcolonial theory, I attempt to show how the Harlem Renaissance can be viewed as a postcolonial phenomenon by alluding to Lawrence Buell's provocative essay, entitled "American Literary Emergence as a Postcolonial Phenomenon" (1992), suggesting the differences and similarities between the American Renaissance and the Harlem Renaissance in terms of the notion of postcoloniality. I argue that the representative postcolonial features of the Harlem Renaissance include the emergence of black English, cultural hybridization, black artists' role as agents for black liberation, the rise of black literary magazines, and the heated debate among the black intellectuals concerning the racial uplift.In Cane and Quicksand, Toomer and Larsen, as mulatto writers, try to demonstrate the plight of black intellectuals who are situated in the so-called internal colony. Ralph Kabnis and Helga Crane, the two protagonists of the texts, internalize the colonial ideology when they first initiate their teachings at black schools in the South. In the course of encountering diverse colonial situation, they experience the hybrid identity of mulatto black intellectuals living in liminal space. However, while Toomer's Kabnis transforms himself into a new identity, showing some hope for the new race, Helga does not overcome her racial burden, falling in the mire of the racialized South. I investigate the ways in which Toomer and Larsen show their postcolonial consciousness by investigating the mulatto protagonists who are situated in their in-between situation, focusing on their identity crises as mulatto black intellectuals.