박태순 소설의 로컬리티와 생태적 상상 - 1960~70년대 소설을 중심으로

Abstract

This paper seeks to investigate the aspects of representation of locality and ecological imagination in Park Tae-soon’s novels. The characteristics of regional space that Park Tae-soon’s novel focuses on are reproduced in various ways in various works. This article believes that the locality and meaning of the space covered in his novel closely corresponds to the change process of historical times and plays a role in vividly reproducing the people living their lives at the time. Specifically, the locality embodied in his novels is formed in the consciousness of displaced persons developed while he was born and raised in the Hwanghae-do Province, experienced the war, and settled down as a refugee from North Korea. The life of the ‘displaced civilians’ that Park Tae-soon focuses on is not simply an experience of the individual self, but can be said to be a world of public memory in which the reality of the division system is engraved. In particular, the meaning of place memory embodied in the symbol of ‘Tree’ shows that the crisis of the ecological world is intertwined with the crisis of people’s lives exposed to war and violence. The characters come to realize the principles of nature’s cycle and ecology in the face of disasters and catastrophes that cannot be countered by manpower. In his novels, the process by which the characters show respect for nature is not simply adaptation, but a process of gaining a new identity in relation to their place. It is expected that these characteristics of the work can provide important implications in interpreting the spatial characteristics of his novels and their meaning of popular character.