The purpose of this study is to define the characteristics of Lee, Tae Joons authorial double desire which is reflected in his whole literature and to clarify the reason of his conversion to socialism after the restoration of independence.
The origin...
The purpose of this study is to define the characteristics of Lee, Tae Joons authorial double desire which is reflected in his whole literature and to clarify the reason of his conversion to socialism after the restoration of independence.
The origin of the dialectic of desire is authorial egocentrism or self-regard. This is displaced into the point of view technique and monological dialogue. According to Lacan, if one believes that he only sees the world and not to be seen by the world, it tells that he is in the imaginative stage in which his ego can be maintained not hurted. But if one knows that he has to be seen by others, he is in the symbolic stage in which the demand of social culture surpassed the subject. Lee, Tae Joons attachment to the eye stage lasts till the final stage of conversion to socialism. His monological dialogue equals to the dichotomy of right and wrong and ultimately to the socialism which separates the subject from the other. Being supported by romantic cognitive mode, this authorial egocentrism endures the series of displacements of desire or egocentrism.
Lee Tae Joons double desires are the ethnical desire and the general desire and they are in discrepancy. In the colonial system, the desire to be the ethnical ego is oppressed by the colonial power and the desire to be the rich, powerful and important being is oppressed by ethnical social culture. Being an orphan at the age of nine, Lee Tae Joon was in socio-economically low status. These two situation conditions the dialectical structure of his narratives.
In his short stories the authorial heroes try to conceal their general desire to be the powerful one and to project their surpassed desire to the negative persons or to entrust the authorial women characters with their desire to be in the center. In the long novel they enter into the enlightenment project after the failure of triangular love affair. For them the love story itself was the game of desire. So the enlightenment project is the displacement of general desire. It has the meaning of compensatory desire. Because the ethnical ideology is not the belief but the compensatory desire, Lee, Tae Joons heroes easily return to the general reality and fall into the conflict of double desire once more. These conflict is symbolized by the parallel dialogue between two authorial characters. Lee, Tae Joons double desire is also reflected into the authorial attitude to the low class people. he usually describes them with the class determined characteristics. They are the persons of every sorts of drives. They have no idea of the wrong social system or structure where they exist. But Lee, Tae Joon as a ethnical ideologist reveals the sympathy to them simultaneously.
Reconsidering about his passive heroism, Lee Tae Joon adopts women characters as his authorial ego. Most of Lee Tae Joons women characters are in the pre symbolic stage. They are the desirable ego of Lee, Tae Joon who is always in the dual castration complex from dual reality. The women characters as the desirable egos of the author, have activity, and pursue their desire for the general world, that is desire for money, social status, power, and western culture. Being the desirable heroines who represent the authors anti-patriarchal system, they also adventure into single person or divorce. Because of their existential position as the desirable ego, they easily transgress the ethnical social norm that one must not compromise with the colonial power. They also reveal the elitism too much.
The significance of the stage of women character is that it is the preparatory stage for the authors conversion to socialism. In this stage the oppressed money theme rises above the surface. The activity and unsurpassed desire of the female ego displaced into the male ego in the later stage of Lee, Tae Joons narrative of authorial double desire. For the first time the man character actively pursues his general desire without concealing and he becomes the tycoon. As a tycoon the hero marries two women who symbolize the ethnical desire and general desire, respectively.
In the final stage of the narrative of the authorial double desire, the real author fulfills his self regard or egocentrism by uniting the two desire openly. He actively rationalizes his individual general desire endowing with the ethnical desire. In this stage, the dichotomy of I and the other recurs to his self defense mechanism. This is the evidence that his conversion to socialism is not an abrupt accident but an expected catastrophe.