회귀 서사의 트라우마 작업화와 정체성 재구성 -〈절대회귀〉 주인공의 회귀 전 경험을 중심으로- = (Working Through Trauma and Identity Reconstruction in Regression Narratives: Focusing on the Protagonist’s Pre-Regression Experience in Absolute Regression)

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

This study investigates the narrative mechanisms of trauma resolution embedded in regression narratives of Korean web fiction through an analysis of Absolute Regression. Drawing on key psychoanalytic concepts—traumatic events, repetition compulsion, deferred representation, and working-through—the study demonstrates that regression functions not merely as a device for temporal reversal or success reenactment, but as a structured process of psychological transformation. The protagonist’s initial experience of trauma, marked by the loss of family and community, is repeatedly reactivated after regression through compulsive repetition and deferred representation. Over time, however, this repetition acquires a reparative function through the reconstruction of agency and interpersonal relationships, particularly the restoration of the father–child relationship, which enables the re-signification of trauma. Furthermore, the recognition of the limitations of future knowledge facilitates working-through and the reconstitution of the protagonist’s identity as an active subject in the present. This study argues that regression narratives possess significant potential to provide psychological resonance and consolation for contemporary readers.