선우휘 소설에 나타난 연대의 성격

초록

Novels written by a writer Seonu Hwi have been mostly analyzed as ‘anti-communism’ or ‘action humanism.’ This perception has been broadly accepted in the history of Korean literature since the 1950s, and few attempts have been made to deviate from this viewpoint. Seonu Hwi received Dongin Literary Award for his novel 「Bulggot(Flame)」 published in 1957, and instantly became a popular writer and a key figure in literature in the post-war era. A more diversified analysis of his novels would help to overcome simplistic understanding of the post-war literature. This article investigates the foundations of Seonu Hwi’s ethics that oscillated between individualism and communalism as shown in earlier discussions over his work. In particular, the focus was put on ‘solidarity.’ His writings revealed peculiarity of a divided country and his personal pain as a defector from North Korea, and as such, they express a unique sense of solidarity. This article examines how people’s self-awareness as a defector from North Korea formed unique sense of solidarity in South Korea, and analyzes specific types of such solidarity. First, the pursuit of emotional solidarity through strong familism and its relationship with ideology is examined. Seonu Hwi expressed concerns over a relationship between family affection and anti-communism in his own way. Additionally, it is examined how the writer’s lifelong emphasis on regionalism, self-awareness as someone from Northwestern part of the peninsula, and consequent sense of solidarity affected his writing. For the writer, regionalism had as much influence as anti-communism on his work. Here what is important is how the writer perceived the operating mechanism of regionalism and the chasm in the actual outcomes of living in South Korea. It is described as a sad pursuit of spots where regionalism-based solidarity cracks through the medium of capital. This article elucidates nature of solidarity shown in Seonu Hwi’s writings and its relationship to the writer’s ethics, and based on this, attempts to show differences with other post-war writers. The objective is to explore a possibility of an analysis over Seonu Hwi’s writing, beyond the prevalent dichotomous thinking, for whom both positive and negative criticisms have been extreme compared to other writers, over the writer’s anti-communism and humanism.

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