군중 속의 여자-채만식의 『탁류』에 나타난 여성 군중과 무질서의 도시공간

Abstract

This study argue that Chae Man-sik’s Muddy Stream is a text that represents disorder of urban space and urban life. For this purpose, the scene that Cho-Bong wandering around the city before killing Hyungbo is closely analyzed. In this scene, Cho-Bong had wandered around the city, losing her ‘reason’, and soon killed Hyungbo in mindless rage. This led to the interpretation of Cho-Bong as a defective subject and Muddy Stream as a vulgar novel. However, this article tried to display that the disorder represented in Muddy Stream is the true face of urbanity, and Chae Man-sik sharply captured it. For this purpose, I passed through the following two detailed targets. First, I analyzed Cho-bong as a specific example of 'female crowd'. The term ‘female crowd’ is in contrast to the privileged urban subject, the flaneur. While flaneurs are generally gendered as male, the passive and irrational aspects of the crowd generally resonate with female gender. In Muddy Stream, Cho-Bong was unable to autonomously move, or observe the city like a flaneur. Instead, she became an anonymous monster, and becoming violent through irrational impulses. This disorder served as an ability to counter men armed with selfish rationality. By emphasizing this point, the privileged status of flaneur and the illusion of modern subjectivity had been scrutinized. Second, it was emphasized that Muddy Stream is creating a plot of modern disorder. In Muddy Stream, Cho-Bong failed to make a reasonable plan. In this reason, Cho-Bong has been interpreted as a defective subject. In addition, Muddy Stream was evaluated as a vulnar text. However, the fact that Cho-Bong moves aimlessly as a crowd and acts unpredictably is related to the complexity and disorder of urban space. In this point, Cho-Bong can be reevaluated as a person who creates a ‘recognitive map’ of complex urban spaces, not just an unreasonalbe person. According to this reading, Cho-Bong is a subject that embodies disorder and is a representation that reveals a complex aspect of modernity. She shows that she can exert active power in the city even if she is not a privileged subject, the flaneur. More importantly, she provides a useful starting point for criticizing on the signs of modernity called reason and order.