A Comparative Study Of Chinese And South Korean Family Novels

China and South Korea were separated only by a river and were closely linked in geographical position, with the result that there were so many material and cultural exchanges in history. As for the cultural attributes, both China and South Korea belonged to Asian Confucian cultural circle, and the Confucian ethics formed the moral consensus of the two countries, so the two countries had many cultural similarities, especially in the period from ancient Korea to Koryo dynasty, Korea had not invented its own language at that time and always used Chinese characters as their language, so China and Korea (South Korea) cultures had natural kinship and more intimate cultural origin. Numerous archaeological facts showed that China, by feat of Chinese characters, played an important role in the literature of South Korea and the history inheritance.Since the 19th century, the fates of China and South Korea were more similar. In the late 19th century, China was invaded by western countries and entered the semi-colony, while the South Korea was also invaded and occupied by Japan, and it entered the colonial period for 36 years. In the course of national salvation, China had experienced May Fourth Movement, many intellectuals took part in the fighting against the imperialism and feudalism, while South Korea was struggling for the national independence——March First Movement. In the early twentieth century, the intellectuals from China and South Korea had experienced the national crisis and individual spirit value crisis. Those tragic historical events made China and South Korea have similar histories context, so the writers from China and South Korea were naturally close and had some possibility and necessity of interaction, and the influence also laid a great foundation for the similarities of literature thought and works.Since the ancient times, the political structures of China and South Korea were closely bound up with the countries survival, the personal destiny and the nation rising. The ups and downs of families all reflected the roughness of nations, and the joys and sorrows of each family silhouetted the minds evolution of colorful characters. At the crucial historical junctions, the old family system collapsed and the new family conception generated, the family fate showed the fate of nation, and the memory of family also became the history of nation. Basing on this point, these events became the important part of many literature works. These development factors laid the solid foundation for the family novel of China and South Korea, as well as fully affirmed the existing value of family novel. The creation concept of the family novel was often about the vicissitudes of one or many families and the existing of families were taken as the main content. The growing experience and the spiritual changes of series figures reflected the destiny of nations, and also verified the existence nature of nations, so the unique aesthetic texture could achieve a rich literary landscape in the literary history.The family and Three Generation, the masterpieces of Ba Jin and YeomSangseop, were written in the historical background of 1930s. China and South Korea were at the stage of new and old histories alternation at that time. With the influence of new thoughts and new cultures, both countries were in the age of denying old system and old morality, as a result of that The family and Three Generation, family novels which were full of old and new contradictions, were produced, as Mr. Gao, the great-grandfather, and Master Zhao, on behalf of the old family power, ran into the new young generation, so The family and Three Generation, on behalf of the family novels of China and South Korea, became the concrete forms of ages alternation, and they were taken as the studying text of China and South Korea for comparing the family novels and showing the cultural revolution of China and South Korea intellectuals under the ancient family system in the transition times of historical culture. The family, written by Ba Jin, and Three Generation, written by YeomSangseop, have some common features on the aspects of old and new contradictions, old and new characters blending and the alternativeness of new and old concepts, so both will have a comparable evaluation.For the time being, Korean culture was increasingly popular in the world, more and more people got interested in Korean culture. Taking the advantages that more concerning on the communication about China and South Korea literatures and more attention were paid on thoughts growing of South Korea intellectuals to improve the global literature movement. In comparing the two works, we can better grasp the nature of writers and works and discover the reason of generating similar literature phenomenon in different ethnic backgrounds, and"May Fourth"spirit and"March First"spirit were also reflected out with the times progressing. At the same time, some rules also can be discovered in the trend of world culture.From the microscopic point of view, many people in China and the world have researched Ba Jin, a great master of literature, and there have been many papers about his works, his thoughts, and his literary and aesthetic value. Similarly, in Korea, there have been many comprehensive and deep results on YeomSangseop, the representative of Korean naturalist writers. However, it is a pity that there are little people comparing the two writers, and this problem is in its infancy, whatever in China and Korea. Especially in China, there are no people considering the problem at all; while in Korea, though there are a few authors discussing this problem, they just focus on the narrative of the works of the two writers. They do not study deeply the important works, The family and Three Generation, on the view of family novel, to appreciate their sociology and culture value. So, the comparison of the works of Ba Jin and YeomSangseop, and their writing background and literary ideas is in half-blank state. However, we think that by comparing the two writers, the literary inheritance spirit of long standing both in Chin and Korea can be well realized, and the value of literature for the society can be obvious. To study better the cultural entities of the two writers and the developing direction of family novels both in China and Korea, it is necessary to compare the two writers deeply. In this thesis, based on the existing results, we discuss the works of Ba Jin and YeomSangseop further by comparing them on the view of family novels, to research the development of the family novels both in China and Korea, and consider their same points and differences in writing background, version and means of artistic expression.Therefore, In this thesis, we focus on the following problems: introducing the development of Chinese Family Novels and South Korean family novel; clarifying the concepts of the family, the familism and the family novels, and overview the traditional family value and the process of historical evolution both in China and South Korea, clean the family value in modern view; by comparing the representative works of the two writers, The family of Ba Jin and Three Generation of YeomSangseop, explore the development history of family value, investigate the crating initiative of writers caused by the social background; by analyzing the themes and characters of the works, study the impact of the social change and Chinese and western cultures on the traditional families when the country is in the war, and the mentality variation of intellectuals both in China and South Korea in the transition from the old to the new; By researching the version of the works, find the same points and differences of the two writers, and further the same points and differences of China and South Korea, and show the developing direction of literature exchange between China and South Korea.Besides the Introduction, this dissertation includes four chapters. The first chapter deals with the concepts of family, family consciousness, family novels, and the brief introduction of the development of family novels both in China and in South Korea. Chapter two mainly focuses on the comparison of family novels' themes. To demonstrated the enormous and complex social changes in the two countries, it depicts the fusion of social cultural psychology and the collapse of family legal system during the transforming period of the old and the new age from the perspectives of consciousness of marriage independence, democracy and equality, and the awakening of nation consciousness. The third chapter deals with the comparison of characters. The author takes the autocratic first generation, the declined second generation and the multi-cultural third generation as the center of her narration. She designs these characters as conservative ones, progressive ones and people with middle position between the two. The author's main focus is the differences and similarities among these characters. Chapter five is the comparison of the text.The author analyses those works' features and characters from the comparison of their narrative modes and multi-cultural details. The last part is the conclusion. Those family novels' social values and literary values and the prospect of the future research are fully discussed.