This paper looked into the literature of Samuidang Kim, who described her life and outlook on the world in a number of literary pieces, although it was a kind of taboo for women of noble class to show literary talent under the times of extremely male-...
This paper looked into the literature of Samuidang Kim, who described her life and outlook on the world in a number of literary pieces, although it was a kind of taboo for women of noble class to show literary talent under the times of extremely male-dominated Joseon Dynasty. Samuidang Kim was born in Seobongbang in Namwon city of North Jeolla province in 1769 and got married to Hauk who lived in the same town as a member of a ruined noble family. She devoted herself to help her husband to have a successful career and achieve social status. Samuidang was happily married and her husband fully supported her literary works and helped her to pursue poetry, which was a rare case of the times. From their wedding night, Samuidang and her husband exchanged poems to show their feelings, and after her husband leaves the house to study for the state examination, she wrote poems to encourage him to study hard. She also wrote poems to honestly describe her feelings and love for her husband, which was a daring thing for the women of her times. Furthermore, Samuidang wrote poems about her efforts in her everyday life to support her husband, and the poems offer vivid description of her life.Samuidang's literature went through changes in the themes and consciousness in the course of her life, and her literarature tends to honestly express the course of her life as it was. Her literature can be divided into the following categories.
The first stage presented the poems Samuidang wrote before getting married. Her poems of this stage were mostly about her self-discipline and her attitude for academic learning, based on her avid reading and ethics of the noble class. The second stage presented the poems that she wrote while living with her husband's family in Namwon. Poems of this stage were the ones that she exchanged with her husband and the ones that showed how she missed her husband who was away for the study. There were also poems that encouraged her husband to succeed in life. The poems of this stage inparticular show her obsession beyond imagination for her husband to pass the state examination and to have a successful career. Passing the examination would mean the possibility to rebuild the ruined family of the mere local noble clan. At the same time, it was a way to satisfy her own desire for success, as it was thoroughly banned for women of her time to have a career in life. Therefore, Samuidang's poems and writings of this stage was filled with her thorough plans, initiatives and instructions for her husband to have a career in the bureaucratic society.
The third stage presented the poems that Samuidang wrote about her everyday life, showing her active and realistic views of life together with the dynamic nature of life, while she had to be responsible for the home economy amid the economic hardships due to the absence of her husband. In the fourth stage, which was after her husband gave up the examination and came back home, Samuidang wrote poems to describe the joy of her life in the country and to show her obsession for the desire for the success in life that was not achieved.
We can see that Samuidang's poems have the characteristics in the fact that she took themes of her poems from everything from her everyday life, as a person actively engaging in her life, not as an observer in the periphery.Therefore, she could achieve the kind of literarature that described the little details of her life as the main grounds for living, instead of belittling and ignoring the details of her life.
In conclusion, Samuidang's literature presented a kind that was completely different from the literature of the women of her contemporary times. Back then, women of the noble families pursued literarature as one part of the men's literarary world. Women of the noble class tried to show their lofty mental status by presenting the ethics of the Confucian ideas. However, Samuidang honestly depicted the course of her life in her literature. Therefore, we need to acknowledge the values of her lietarature, asit vividly presented the realities of the life. Samuidang's poems and writings are the model examples of the lady literature that could overcome the agony of the realities with the love and literature.