Steinbeck의 社會小說, The Grapes of Wrath 考

梁秉錫 圓光大學校大學院 1980 學位論叢 Vol.4 No.-

"The Grapes of Wrath" made its author, John Steinbeck, world famous and also brought him a storm of public controversy, and severe, poignant criticism, both favorable and unfavourable. He was denounced by one side as a political agitator or communist. while praised by the other side as one of the best novelist who picturized the contemporary social situation in the most exact terms. The book was once burnt and barred from many public libraries. Such public commotion stemmed mainly from the social content of the book, which dealt with the miserable lives of the tenant farmers who were driven out of their land during the great panic period of the 30s. Since the early 20th century, American realism has been producing many novels dealing with social problems such as economic, political or labor conditions with an intention to change or improve the social condition. Such novels would make rise of public sensation or emotional appeal; and sometimes, contributed to society by bringing an actual and effective change of the social conditions. Probably, "The Jungle" by Upton Sinclair could be the best example: it led the contemporary political attention to the miserable labor conditions in the canning factories in Chicago and changed them through new legislation And "The Grapes of Wrath", also focused pubulic attention on the plight of the immigrant farmers and improved their condition. In some aspects, the realism itself essentially connotes a writer's intention of such a social impact, because of the nature of realism that has very much of a factualism and objectivism in it ; and because the representing a life as it is means a true understanding, that leads, somewhat, to a spiritual process toward the betterment of life. But, such as intention is not the main role of literature; and we notice that a lot of such intended novels become degraded to mere propaganda or to mere journalistic reporting, losing their emotional appeal along with the change of social condition. "The Jungle" might be this case: it could hardly be said that it still retains the emotional appeal and the literary flavor nowadays, since such factory lobor condition as depicted in it, has gone out of sight, at least in the United States, where a basic living is guaranteed. "The Grapes of Wrath," however, still remains a best seller, in spite of its similarity with "The Jungle" at the points that dealt with a labor problem which was a particular subject at a particular time, and that the lives so destitute as depicted in the novel are hardly found nowadays at least in America. The main concern of this thesis is to find out what artistries of the fiction could make "The Grapes of Wrath" timelessness, and what was its real social message that had raised such public controversies and commotion. By reviewing the background that made the birth of "The Grapes of wrath" through the author's literary career and the contemporary social condition, it was reaffirmed that this novel was the result of the writer's strong humanistic passion toward the lives of the tenant farmers who were driven out of their homeland by land monopoly and were westering from Oklahoma to California looking for a job. It is the factual record of every trace of their lives in hardships suffering from the wages dropping down and the opression and the contemptuous treatment by the public, especially by the landowner organiz ed into the Associated Farmers. The story carries passages denouncing the happening of the tragedy of the homeless, workless and starving people, by showing the social climate represented by the protagonist, "Joad family", and it also carreis a theme of the oppressed growing from individual "I" to group "we". This might be the reason for the opposers to interpret the novel as a malicious attack against the existing social system, private ownership and, democracy. Such in terpretation. however, is nothing but the result of superficial reading, or mere preoccupation believing that anything said favorably for the poor would bring social disorder. In fact, there is no author's theoretical economic creed expressed in the novel at all. The novel is more like a tragedy of collapsing agrarianism, maybe, Jeffersonian, which is based strongly on the private land ownership, because Joad family had the pure dignity by owning their own land when they were freehold farmers, before they were ruined. Before then, they reaped what they sowed, with high degree of self-sufficiency, acted in accordance with their own instincts or desires; they were truely independant economically and politically; they could be complete individualists with substantial and genuine virtue by owning their own land. Unfortunately, a natural disaster, the long draught forced them to be fallen to tenants, consequently to the landless. They longed for land to possess. There is no tint in this novel that the author opposes the system of private ownership; but he only opposed the form of land monopoly. And the group concept "we" is not at all, the totalitarianism nor the collectivism ignoring individual interest and freedom because the idea of Casy is more like Emersonian "Over Soul", or biological group concept that is Steinbeck's own reasoning through his earlier interest in biology, which is also transcendentalism. We could say, at least, the idea is spiritual not materialistic group concept of the communistic tract. Also the individual lives in the sponteneous group formed of the immigrant farm workers denotes a Whitemanian "En-mass" which respects the individual There are no grounds to denounce Steinbeck as a communist or a political agitator for class war. In the novel Steinbeck just remind us of what we all do know; the contemporary situation of production and finance involves innumerable instances of cruel hardship and injustice; that it needs constant adjustment and control within the existing system by the conscience of democratic people; and he holds the community responsible for the men, like Okies in the novel, without work, home, or food, alludingly invoking the profound philosophy of human fellowship. As to the timelessness of the novel, the following prominent features of his artistries in "The Grapes of Wrath" can be distinguished. First, in the material, the presented persons who are prototype farmers, old American stock closest to the earth, the nature; and who possess the primitive virtues that we have lost Now render themselves with the nostalgic emotion. The adventure of these simplest persons overcoming the brute forces of nature, the draught, the social environment through their westering to California, has in itself an epic quality showing a kindred heroism of common people. Second, unlike "The Jungle" by Upton Sinclair, in which we feel somewhat like a theory coming first and then labors to create characters who will prove it, "The Grapes of Wrath" is the other way round; the characters are created homely and the social philosophies are developed by the people trying to figure out a way through life's labrynth. Third, by successfully manipulating the interchapter which is a difficult device to keep fictional unity, the social situations are so effectively dramatized and fused into a single image of the social climate in keeping with the main the meof the concrete Joad's adventure without any divided feeling. Fourth, the novel's Biblical assimilation of Exodus and its symbolism universalize the specific story of Joads and Okies to be a prototype of migration through the history of mankind since time immemorial. This also dignifies the story with the echo of the Biblical prophecy. Fifth, the evoking of the seriousness of the social problem is greater than any other social protest novel; but it is not narrow class conscience, it is sublimated into a lofty spirit of human fellowship. Sixth, the properly employed versatile and marvellous prose styles; pithy, concise, colloquial, poetic, biblical, epic with Iylic, the staccato, veritable chameleon……encompass almost every world of human emotion to tune the heart strings of the readers. This is, no doubt, a great achievement in the history of American realism. Above all, "The Grapes of wrath" has not only the particular subject of the Oklahoma farmer and an oversupply of labor in California orchards, but also it has general subject of man pitted against the forces of nature; and the latter is more prominently emerged as the leading theme of life-instinct, the will to live and the faith in life, that is much to remind one of Robinson Crusoe. If such novel as Daniel Defoe's, that has main theme of a tenacious will to live coping with its environment does appeal to readers, "The Grapes of wrath" will do as well, regardless to the change of its social situation.

EDGAR ALLAN POE의 窮極的 理想

梁秉錫 圓光大學校 文理科大學 學徒護國團 1984 文理硏究 Vol.2 No.-

스포츠·교육·군사·산업·사무실까지 영역을 넓히는 VR - 세상이 넓어진다, 세계가 많아진다

양병석 한국콘텐츠진흥원 2016 케이콘텐츠 Vol.- No.5·6

스타인벡의 'To a God Unknown' 의 主題에 관한 小考

양병석 圓光大學校 文理科大學 英語英文學科 1986 英語英文學 Vol.3 No.-

『월든』에서 본 소로의 수사적 기예

양병석 ( Yang Pyong-sok ) 대한영어영문학회 2002 영어영문학연구 Vol.28 No.3

The purpose of this paper is to study Thoreau's rhetoric arts, especially in his Walden. Most of the argument of Walden are presented in the first two chapters - ‘Economy’ and ‘Where I Lived and What I Lived for’. The rest of Walden exhibits somewhat a different tone - conciliation and poetic evocation, while maintaining an undercurrent of argument. It is found that paradoxes, word-plays, the creation of personae, audience and narrator ‘I’, the persuasive power by analogy, descriptions in detail, attacking the inconsistencies of foils and etc. are used as the rhetoric tools. By a paradoxical introduction of Walden Thoreau made his readers acquainted with their mode of life; and he let paradoxes present his propositions that he gradually amplified with concrete detail or developed with further propositions. He used argumentative paradoxes along with other rhetoric tools to urge his readers to choose whether the sham of traditional thoughts and the blindness of material civilization, or the communion with spiritual inner-light of self with the simple and serene life. Along with word-plays, they are used to have ‘agreeable surprise’ and ‘vitality’ occur in the readers' mind as well as in his writing, to divert them from the lethargy of conventional thought. He used analogy and satirical attacks of the inconsistencies to lend authenticity to his argument. Thoreau created personae, the well-defined audience synecdochically typified by the men of the conventional civilization and the individual characters as representative sampling of the culture, who serve as foils for the narrator's wit. He also projected himself, the narrator ‘I’ into a persona characterized as a shrewd yankee with good principle, good will and good sense, so that he can be acceptable to the audience, create a rapport with them. By all these means he makes his argument persuasive and credible. And all the rhetorical tools are interrelated one another to serve the purpose to support the paradoxical proposition, ‘the less, the more’, materially poor but mentally rich. < Wonkwang University >

신비주의와 잠재의식 - 스타인벡의 『미지의 신에게』에서

양병석 ( Pyongsok Yang ) 대한영어영문학회 2000 영어영문학연구 Vol.26 No.1

Steinbeck’s novels in general contain some myths or mystical elements; and his To a God Unknown in particular, seems to be unrealistic mysticism in a superficial view as its title suggests. In fact, not a few critics thought so. But, in the light of the modern psychology, it is found that it has more concrete grounds to be construed rather real than ethereal, rather natural than supernatural. This thesis is to study the background of its birth and scrutinize its plot to find the true theme of the novel. As the result, it reached a conclusion that it is a novel of subconsciousness, that is, a psychological, and it shows that the two opposing elements ― the world of mankind and the world of nature ― can be harmonized only through the subconsciousness; and the circulation of man and nature potentially exists in it. < Wonkwang University >

헨리 소로의 개혁론 - 『개혁에 관한 글들』을 중심으로 -

양병석 ( Pyong-sok Yang ) 대한영어영문학회 1999 영어영문학연구 Vol.25 No.1

This study is to scrutinize Henry Thoreau’s reform papers to comprehend the true nature of his reform philosophy, and also to find out which is really true figure, a political pacifist disapproving violent and organized protest, or a potential violent revolutionary. The findings are as following: His abiding interest in reform is rooted in his early transcendentalism, the ideal of self-culture, believing a true reform can be achieved by truly self-cultured individual, not by organization. The true economy is not material riches but inner spiritual wealth; the economy most in harmony with God and nature was always the most practical. He recommends a living based on love of truth rather than love of gold; and get living by loving. On politics and slavery, he theorized a peaceful nonviolent protest based on the individual’s minimum social duty that he may do his own works, but he must not do them, sitting on the shoulders of others; and he must not help evil at least. But he changed his attitude to the recognition of violent organized protest in case of the worst condition of evil. He was rather a violent reformist than a pacifist, who used his pen as a gun against all evils. All these he convincingly advocated by his peculiar powerful rhetorics.

소로의 사상에 미친 동서적 요소 - 사상의 변화 과정을 중심으로 -

양병석 ( Pyong-sok Yang ) 대한영어영문학회 1997 영어영문학연구 Vol.22 No.1

This study traces the developments of Thoreau’s thoughts, in a vision of the universe and of man rooted in the transcendentalist current of thought in 19C New England, in order to scan what eclectical elements, especially the eastern and the western thoughts are involved in them. In the formative years of his philosophy, he was deeply influenced by the thoughts of Waldo Emerson’s idealism, which was formulated on the basis of Plato’s idealism, eclectically with Hindu philosophy, adapting Kantean terminology, the ‘priori’. Emerson expounded the epistemology, ‘Reason over Understanding’ as the only cognitive power intuitively to find the ultimate truth. He also formulated various concepts, such as ‘the nature as the symbols of thoughts’, ‘over-soul’, ‘correspondence theories in universe/nature/man’, ‘ethical law identical with physical law’, ‘the theory of compensation’, ‘microcosm as individual’, and so on. Generally until about mid-1840s, Thoreau accepted Emerson’s idealism; however, he inclined more toword Hindu philosophy, especially yoga practice and its ‘true knowledge’. He was deeply influenced by its asceticism and simple living, which formed his doctrine of smplicity. Since the later parts of 1840s, his epistemology gradually turned from the world of reason, the world of ideas, to the world of understanding, the world of the empirical. His search for truth became more scientific; and finally found the nature as ultimate reality, with its fundamentality, eternity, purity, and simplicity. On this practical ground he faced all the 19th Century issues, the cultures, the industrial, as well as the human rights. In this later process his methods was closer to Aristotelian as a western philosophy than to Plato; and influenced by Confucianism, especially in his theme of ‘Self-Culture’.

수필:큰집형 이야기,밤길을 가며,숫병아리,포대기사랑,아픔,하숙집아줌마

백시영,양병석,정재호,윤수천,정주환,양주석 북한연구소 1982 北韓 Vol.- No.126

해양구조물 제작시 발생되는 오염물질 감정법 개발 연구

서문석,양병석,염규설,채홍기 해양환경안전학회 2012 해양환경안전학회 학술발표대회 논문집 Vol.2012 No.11