검열관 니시무라 신타로(西村太)에 관한 고찰

Abstract

This study is to research on Nishimura Shintaro, a Japanese censor who is known as having mercilessly censored Koreans' writing during the Japanese colonial period. First, I will attempt to investigate the different aspects between his first book, The Appearances of Joseon(朝鮮の俤, 1923) and his other similar pieces of writing which were written in order to provide ‘informations about Joseon’ at that time, so that we could obtain a picture about what senses of mission and attitudes he was holding. Secondly, I will try to find out what points of view and understanding towards Korean language he had while serving as an censor. In fact, because he would express the thoughts about his duties that he was himself a researcher on Korean language as well as a censor, I will illuminate what the true intention of his such utterances were. Finally, I will also examine his translations, including his translation in 1939 of Hino Ashihei(火野葦平)'s Barley and Soldiers(麦と兵隊) which was carried out at the request of the Government-General. It is notable that at that time ‘Jeonseon Munhakseon(Selection of War Frontier Literature)’ was being published serially in a journal called Munjang under a scheme of the Government-General. Especially after the period of the Joseon National Literature, ‘the position and duties of an editor’ got to hold an important role in censoring, and in this process his translations had an effect on such censoring power of an editor.