1950년대 모더니즘 시에 나타난 과학기술의 표상― ‘시의 과학화’라는 테제와 시적 형상

Abstract

The combination of poetry and science was a very important thesis in 1950’s Korean modern poetry. Modernist poets in 1950’s believed that it was a main task of Korean modern poetry to have science characteristic. So, they more radically pursued their aesthetic ideals of the combination of poetry and science than Kim-kirim in 1930’s. This poetic tendency resulted from their strong opposition to traditional poetry of the same age. They thought that traditional poetry to express oriental nature was old-fashioned, and that it was an effective way of innovation of modern poetry to write developed mechanisms and represent contemporary scientific civilization. Meanwhile, they named themselves a ‘citizen’, which meant a cosmopolitan following international development course. It was regarded a fundamental condition to have science characteristic for establishing cosmopolitan identity. They considered the urgent retention of internationality as a historical precedence, and believed that establishing cosmopolitan identity and securing internationality depended on ‘becoming science’ in themselves. To them, the essence of modernity was the achievement of science. This ideas of 1950’s modernists were created by their senses of cosmopolitan identity and viewpoints of regarding with the best science. This thoughts about the modernization of Korean poetics were reflected in the representations of scientific technology in 1950’s modern poetry. For example, the ‘earth’ represented a wide residence of cosmopolitans, and a ‘international train’ symbolized their self-image in many poems. Comparing with an sad local train expressing their hidden femininity, a loudly international train embodied the ideal masculinity to desire to possess. But the fact that many advanced products of science and technology were not theirs could not help causing double alienation from their ideals because modernists in 1950’s did not even have partial symbols, namely ‘jet plane’, ‘aircraft’, ‘helicopter’ and so on. Due to this, the poetic representations of scientific technology were often likened to various ‘tearful natures’. This sorrow was necessarily caused by double alienation from high technology and by a failure of establishing strong masculine identity.