「写生」の境界

―高浜虚子『朝鮮』の様式―

抄録

　In 1911, Takahama Kyoshi traveled to Korea (or, as it was called at the time, “Chosun”), which had become a part of the Japanese Empire, and wrote the novel Chosun. In this work, Kyoshi is considered to have “sketched” unfamiliar things in the newly colonized land of Korea and thus satisfied the exoticism of many Japanese readers. On the other hand, however, the story itself is of a Korean political activist called Ko-san, and his Japanese colleague, Ishibashi. This paper will explore the complex interconnections between the representational aspect of the novel and the political story that focuses on Kosan and Ishibashi.

　 this novel, “ I,” the first-person narrator, depicts Ko-san’s actions and expressions, but never reveals his inner emotions and thoughts. In fact, before Japan took over Korean rule in 1910, Ko-san was a pro-Japanese political reformist who had been living in Japan for twelve years as a refugee, becoming friends with many Japanese activists including Ishibashi. Political novels written before 1910 often portray the friendship and cooperation between such Korean and Japanese activists; in Chosun, however, Ko-san and Ishibashi have nothing to do with the new political situation after 1910. They just impress readers with their mysterious appearances, and nothing seems to happen in the world they live in. In this sense, the novel Chosun does not tell any interesting political story―only a calm and domesticated political space of a colonized Korea is fully described in Kyoshi’s “sketch”.