광야의 상징성에 관한 小考 ― 이육사의<曠野>와 穆旦의 <在曠野上>을 중심으로

Abstract

Lee Yuksa and Mu Dan were poets who created poetry in Korea and China respectively in the common time of 1930s and early 1940s. Both Lee Yuksa and Mu Dan share the image of ‘Wilderness’ by writing the poem “The Wilderness (광야)” and “In the Wilderness (在曠野上)”. Since the mid 1930s, there have been many poems with the title of ‘The Wilderness’ in Korea and Japan. However, while many were meant to serve the strategy of Japan’s permanent occupation of Manchuria, the “wilderness” of Lee Yuksa and Mu Dan were clearly different from that which the poetry titled “Wilderness”. What made the poets who lived in two different spaces dream about the same space called “Wilderness”? The tragic perception of the world, unable to compromise with the world, led the two poets to a “wilderness” as a space where they could open their inner freedom. The “wilderness” as a place to get freedom of thought has utopian character. However, the acquisition of Utopia was not easy to obtain or dream of two poets. In the case of Lee Yuksa, the utopia through thorough self-sacrifice was left in the future, and Mu Dan frustrated about utopia after thorough criticism of reality.