The Discourse of Madness in Plath`s and Gilman`s Pathology

( Gum Hee Che ) 한국현대영어영문학회 2013 현대영어영문학 Vol.57 No.1

Che, Gum-Hee. “The Discourse of Madness in Plath`s and Gilman`s Pathology”. Modern Studies in English Language & Literature 57.1 (2013): 311-26. Highlighting the lack of communication between a male doctor (the observer) and a female patient (the observed), Plath and Gilman subvert the role of the observer (the master of madness), who fills himself with doctrines and myths of reason, and discredit his clinical diagnosis and treatment, believing that pathology as such cannot explain the unconscious of her psyche. Escaping the symmetrical polar opposition between the doctor and the patient, they reveal that the objectivity of the unconscious is an illusion and her psyche may not be approached by reason and observation. The discourse of madness in Plath and Gilman`s pathology presents a very thin layer between sanity and madness, which may open the door to a wider outlook on the relation between the human psyche and the unconscious. As there is no distinct line between sanity and madness, it would not be easy for one to find any definite borderline between the doctor and the patient. (Chungbuk National University)

The Splits of the Other in Amy Tan`s The Hundred Secret Senses

( Gum Hee Che ) 미국소설학회(구 한국호손학회) 2010 미국소설 Vol.17 No.2

Amy Tan creates a dramatic revelation of the suppressed half in the human psyche, interpreting the splits of the unconscious as spirits in the Yin world. Operating as a physical presentation of human unconsciousness, the spirits are the body of desire that the system once suppressed so as to promote the reasonable ideology of the society. The system, in which its rational violence is ready to devalue uncertainties, acts as an agency for the force of reason and coherency, which is central to personal autonomy. Under the very system of enlightenment, readers find Kwan-the main character-who swings back and forth between death and life, and spirits and humans. Hundred Secret Senses describes a post-structuralist zone called the other, where there is no clear distintion between spirits and humans. The spirits are the splits of the other, which seem to reside in the realm of human unconsciousness. Kwan challenges the psychological/systematic violence, discounting the notion of an autonomous sphere and reflecting upon the extended dimension of the human psyche. Her secrets create what contemporary theorists would call a deconstructive aspect of human unconsciousness.

Truth, Reality, and Pynchon's V: From Aestheticism to Dissemination

Che, Gum-Hee The English Teachers Association in Korea 2007 영어어문교육 Vol.13 No.3

Indeterminacy, along with the traces of the unknown identity V, plays a crucial role in building a new possibility in the narrative V. While the characters search for the single identity of V, Pynchon never lets readers and critics reach any final destination or goal in analyzing the novel. Exploring the multiple possibilities and meanings of life, the characters merely keep traveling and searching, without ever reaching any final conclusion or destination. The journey without ever reaching a final destination equals going beyond the boundary and embracing the margins of various possibilities. It concerns the Others and breaks off the hierarchy of Western metaphysics, which is quite similar to what the theorists of deconstruction seek to do. The search without ever reaching a final destination not only designates the multifarious aspect of truth, but it also suggests the possibility of the multiple meanings of words that the characters create. Just as their stories are abundant, the meaning that they produce with their stories can be open-ended. The notion of indeterminacy and broadness in this text, which can be well explained by Derrida, makes it possible for one to search for something other than the fixed meanings or truth claims. The text becomes multifarious in meaning as well as in structure, thus rejecting any kind of singular signifying act.

A Semihuman Identity in William Henry Hudson’s Green Mansions

Che, Gum-Hee 신영어영문학회 2013 신영어영문학 Vol.54 No.-

Rima originates from the space where the distinction between humans and animals has disappeared, and the dialectical swing between reality and fiction reveals itself as animality overlaps with humanity in the name of nature. Deeply rooted in the world of civilization where animality has been highly repressed by the empire of reason, Abel is greatly disturbed by the existence of her semihuman identity. She may be a new breed of character with multiple identities, who hardly resembles conventional female characters projected by the Western canon, and her semihumanity presents a post-structuralist way of narrative that deconstructs the age-old empire of philosophical conventions like consistency, ontological closure, and existential autonomy. The presence of semihuman discourse in her existence contributes significantly to the idea that seemingly exotic, mysterious identities are in fact deeply implicated in humans and that the distinction between humans and animals is impossible. (Chungbuk National University)

The Meaning of Nature in a Post-structural Reading : Eudora Welty’s The Wide Net and Other Stories

Che, Gum-Hee(제금희) 신영어영문학회 2014 신영어영문학 Vol.57 No.-

The main subject of this article is to understand the meaning of nature in Eudora Welty’s The Wide Net and Other Stories, subsequently analysing the images of the frozen land, the river, the heron, and the winds. “The First Love” deconstructs the line between life and death through the meaning of the frozen land, as the text seriously considers the possibility of seeing the world of death as magical and even productive. “The Wide Net” attempts to reflect upon the transcendental and aesthetic meanings of human existence through criticizing various individuals living with fake identities and masks in front of the human fate of living and dying. “A Still Moment” is a text about breaking the line between the sacred and the earthly, and the main character is interested in challenging the dichotomy of spirits and humans. The text “The Winds” experiments with new alternatives that highlight the values of fragmentation and multiplicity while criticizing the authorities of literary conventions like the existence of truth and absolute reality. Introducing characters who seriously question the mystic identity of truth, Welty seems to react against the conventional academia that often likes to aestheticize the world.

Rethinking the History of Psychoanalysis in The White Hotel by D. M. Thomas : from the Treatment of What Is Visible (Symptoms) tothe Recognition of What Is Inside (Split)

Che, Gum-hee 한국중앙영어영문학회 2006 영어영문학연구 Vol.48 No.1

The word insanity has been associated with a state of mental derangement or craziness that goes against the will of a rational society, which tends to label a person crazy when he/she acts irrationally and incoherently. I am interested in discussing how the meaning of insanity has been misused and how often people confuse the unconscious with craziness. As we see in The White Hotel, society is usually the one that accuses one of irrationality and incoherence, causing him/her to transform into the stage of insanity. If we take insanity as some kind of reactionary behaviour or state caused by the rational oppression of a society, however, there is really no reason that one should feel insecure about his/her insanity. The White Hotel serves as an allegory that disqualifies the traditionalists-Sigmund Freud, Ernest Jones, and D. H. Lawrence-who constantly highlight what is visible (the symptom), and promotes a new line of psychoanalytic theorists-R. D. Laing and Jacques Lacan-who seem to be much more interested in what is invisible. The first group is mostly interested in deciphering the operation of the unconscious and therefore attempts to treat the symptom, while the new line of psychoanalysts engages in investigating what is invisible and consequently takes madness as something intrinsic.

After Exhaustion : Toward the Rhetoric of Indifference with Cybernetic Narratives

Gum-Hee Che 신영어영문학회 2006 신영어영문학 Vol.34 No.-

Kathy Acker’s narrative is full of splits and gaps, which evidently disqualify the age-old regime of coherency in a linguistic structure. Breathing in an environment where values have been exhausted and nothing remains except disinterest and dispassion, her characters often suffer from psychological breakdowns. We later come across the idea that the notion of exhaustion, which produces incoherent usage of words and disruptive behaviors for Acker’s cyberpunk novel, promotes a representation of silence in the hypertext fiction of Micheal Joyce. The journey into indifference, beginning with a series of language games and the knot of splits and gaps, finally reaches the point where nothing remains except the deep breath of silence. Silence then facilitates the ontology of individual discourse while discrediting the totality of mass discourse in order to generate what I would call the rhetoric of indifference.

An Apology for Mocking Birds in D. M. Thomas’ Swallow

Che, Gum-hee 한국중앙영어영문학회 2008 영어영문학연구 Vol.50 No.1

Arguing mainly for the socio-ideological importance of art, some critics from the School of Social Responsibility (Shelley, Gardner, Bakhtin, and Horkheimer) note that writers are a group of influential people who should be responsible for what they create in their literary practices. Many characters in contemporary discourses, however, represent a persona who hardly worries about the possible consequences of his/her writing and defies the traditional image of a responsible writer. Replenishing the brand-new value for the postmodernist writer who refuses to believe in transcendental truths and interlocking social and ideological systems, these characters seem to support the notion that the social responsibility of literature is nothing but an illusion and fake intellectuality. In fact, an increasing number of contemporary theorists (Federman, Gass, Derrida, and Barthes) have struggled to save what some people might call art for art’s sake by defending the kind of art that seems to stay away from the socio-ideological function and didactic/rational responsibility. Used to such literary terms as antinovels, metafiction, surfiction, or postmodern imitation, a plenty of contemporary writers like D. M. Thomas tend to wave away the burden of truth and reality, releasing themselves from the cage of conventional morals and ethics.

A Derridean/Foucaultian Reading of Poe`s Narratives

( Gum Hee Che ) 한국현대영어영문학회 2014 현대영어영문학 Vol.58 No.1

The paper presents a Derridean/ Foucaultian reading of Poe`s narratives by discussing his several stories in terms of the polarities of life and death, and offenders and victims. The meaning of death is to be re-examined in Poe`s deconstructive narratives, as the meaning of power is subverted in his psychoanalytic narratives. There is very little evidence that life is clearly demarcated by death in “Ligeia” and “The Premature Burial,” and Poe`s textuality has less to do with his dwelling in the dichotomy of life and death than it does with his crossing the boundary between them. The narrators in the stories react against the dichotomy of life and death, which may attract the deconstructive approaches of Derrida. Furthermore, there is a subversive relationship between the role of the observer and that of the observed in such stories as “The Black Cat” and “The Casket of Amontillado.” The concept of observation in Poe`s narratives has a peculiar meaning in regard to Foucault`s theories, as Poe participates in examining the ways that this type of new observation intersects with the conventional notions of the observer and the observed. The offender may be a master who observes and controls the observed, but he ironically falls victim to the situation that he creates. (Chungbuk National University)

The Discourse of Magic in Bernard Malamud’s “The Jewbird”

Che, Gum-Hee(제금희) 신영어영문학회 2015 신영어영문학 Vol.60 No.-

The existence of a talking bird may be a significant symbol of magic in Bernard Malamud’s “The Jewbird.” The text criticizes the human prejudice against magic, introducing a talking bird named Schwartz who is free to engage in a conversation with humans. The characters react differently to the discourse of magic, which may symbolize the fact that people have different attitudes toward fantasy. The discourse of magic from the bird contrasts sharply with the plain realistic life of Cohen, the main character, who is mostly drawn to the ideology of reason. His wife Edie reacts differently, however, to the bird that has brought lots of unusual excitement in the family. Mostly, the narrative of “The Jewbird” accounts for the differences between the bird’s magical strategies and Cohen’s strict ideology; all these tales of magic from the bird without tangible evidence make little sense to Cohen, who takes a drastically different view of the bird’s mysterious words. Cohen’s perspective, more than any other, leads directly to the violence of reason, while the bird manages to preserve his magical traits despite Cohen’s severe criticism.