박경리 초기소설에 나타난 서사적 지향

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to investigate the meaning of Park Kyung-ni literature through the aspects of alienation in the eldest sons and daughters raised by single mothers based on her short novels published in the 1950s to 1960s. The main texts for discussion included 「Dora-on Goyang-i」, 「Eunhasu」, 「Solbaram」, 「Chu-eok」, whereas other short novels were used as supplementary texts. Park Kyung-ni’ earlier novels focused consistently on the alienation of widows, the said four novels dealt with the alienation of the eldest sons and daughters raised by single mothers. The growth of the eldest sons and daughters raised by single mothers after the war was developed in three aspects. First, they experienced alienation caused by their tragic realities and they self-internalized their external experiences and created their own experiences beyond the external ones, thus completing the growth of individuals in the twisted history. Second, a sense of alienation felt by the people was strengthened after the war due to the poverty and terror derived from the cracks of their community. Third, the protagonists equipped with refined self-ego could not conform to the realities and built the boundaries between themselves and the world via alienation. The protagonists tended to have ‘an aversion to ordinary customs, which would be characterized by excessive shyness, stubborn mysophobia and arrogance’, and they voluntarily alienated themselves from outside world. The reason for their obstinate choice of alienation in their distorted growing process was that they wanted to complete their growth through the struggle against their inner self in the process of modernization. The alienation felt by the figures in the novels ended up with completing love through ‘making relationships’ of the so-called re-formation of family. Park Kyung-ni viewed ‘family’ and ‘love’ as the most important elements in people's growth and this was closely connected with ‘a will to life’, which was the central theme of her literature. The width of its epic was in turn expanded into human beings, society and nature.