『홍루몽』의 다의적 연구양상에 관한 고찰

A Study of Diverse Researches on Hong-Lou-Meng

Hong-Lou-Meng has been recognized as one of the best Chinese classical novels in the academic circle, fascinating readers with its literary excellence. However, at the same time, the novel has been known as a very difficult text to comprehend because it contains a number of critical moments where the readers find it very hard to understand the author's intended meaning due to unique narration methods and symbolic techniques. Moreover, the commentary by Zhi-Yan-Jai who was acquainted with the author contains a great deal of contents urging the readers to explain the author's intent or comprehend the author's original intention. This has triggered the Chinese psychology of trying to search for the hidden meanings behind the novel. To resist against "Xin-Suo-Yin-Pai", Hu-Shi contended "New Hong-Xue" by publishing scientific researches of the novel, but he could not free himself from the traditional idea that the novel is merely a tributary to Chinese history by insisting on perceiving Hong-Lou-Meng as a personal biography. Since the 1950s, even "Li-Shi-Zheng-Zhi-Xue-Pai" has been interpreting Hong-Lou-Meng politically by blindly following the research method of giving importance to morality (the search for meaning) prevalent in the traditional academic circle. The coherent tendency behind this rich diversity of research tradition of Hong-Lou-Meng is the hold-back of the independence of literature and peripheral attention to the text. The diverse nature of research tradition resulted in trapping the scholars in the rut of 'rigid diversity' rather than opening up the diversity of texts. For this reason, researches on the text of Hong-Lou-Meng have never drawn any central attention from the Hong-Xue scholars. In the beginning of the 20th century, Wang-Guo-Wei attempted a cultural criticism of the text of Hong-Lou-Meng, but his attempt was not sufficient enough to break down the stronghold of the traditional academics. Thus, it was not until late in the 20th century that active researches of the text began to be made. Now that we are living in the 21th century, we should no longer stick to nebulous questions ; that is, those hackneyed theoretical questions surrounding the novel - the author vs. the family or the world and whether it is an orignal work or follow-up. It is high time to restore our focus to the literary value of the novel itself in order to find a right direction of research in the future. Regardless of theoretical controversies, Hong-Lou-Meng has already become a valuable cultural asset for quite a number of readers so that they have been enjoying reading it in their own way. Therefore, we should not let our need to try to find all the right pieces in this theoretical puzzle game delay our effort to seek to find the literary identity of the text itself. In this respect, a recent active effort of some young scholars to put emphasis on the cultural meanings and the narration structure of Hong-Lou-Meng is a desirable wave of research that is expected open up a new venue of research.