Psychoanalysis.  2020 Oct;31(4):81-90. 10.18529/psychoanal.2020.31.4.81.

Study for Novelist Han Kang’s Story “The Vegetarian” in the Perspective of the Unconscious

• Lee HK
• Yoon HR

• KMID: 2507775
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.18529/psychoanal.2020.31.4.81

Abstract

Han Kang’s novel “The Vegetarian” is consist of three medium-length story. The first of these novels, “The Vegetarian” has a nar-rative structure in which the husband, father, mother who represent the patriarchal social structure, gives impetus to the inner bal-ance of Young-Hye, and the unconscious of Young-Hye, that responds to it, produces various symptoms such as vegetarian. The author analyzed that the symptoms and changes of Yeong-Hye are the result of the compromise formation by responding to the unconscious elements of Yeong-Hye, such as aggression, libido, defense, and superego. In addition, the author argued that the lo-cation of this novel in the entire novel of Han Kang is to expose the aggression/violence existing in human and social unconscious to the space of discourse, which is similar to confrontation in the process of psychoanalysis. Through this paper, the author will confirm and assert that the unconscious from clinical experience is in an important position in the understanding of contemporary literary aesthetics.

Keyword

Novelist Han Kang; Novel “The Vegetarian”; The unconscious; Contemporary literary aesthetics