The late 19th to early 20th century was a period of great transformation in Korean
literature. However, change was also accompanied by continuity, with works that
inherited or utilized the styles of pre-modern periods existing alongside works of
a new stylistic form. This was the situation for &ldquoself-narrative&rdquo works which looked
back upon, recorded and evaluated the meaning of a person&rsquos life. Prior to the
modern period, works that took the writer&rsquos own life as the subject matter were rare
in traditional East Asian literature as the European tradition of writing confessions
was absent. As a result, the autobiography, in the European sense, did not exist.
Nevertheless, self-narrative works which took on the forms of other pre-existing
literary genres can be observed. Examples of self-narrative works which utilized
traditional literary forms can also be found in the Korean literature of the late 19th to
early 20th century. These works differ from European autobiographies in terms their
objectivity and style their characteristic features are the way in which the historical
circumstances of the time, which are not harmonious, are reflected and how the
transformation of the social group, rather than the individual, is emphasized. On the
other hand, self-narrative works which adopted new literary styles from Europe or
Japan also began to appear, produced by individuals who had become familiar with
the Christian tradition or who had studied abroad. Examples of this can be found
in the works of An Jungg?n, Jang ?ngjin and Yi Kwangsu which demonstrate the
adoption of new techniques that allow confessions or the disclosure of the writer&rsquos
inner side. These new forms of self-narrative cannot be regarded, in terms of their
content and theme, as representing a development but their unique significance
cannot be denied as well.
