Abstract

Emphasizing the communication and timeliness of writings, Taekdang(澤堂) thought that the writings since Tang and Song Dynasties should be the model works. He especially put a high valuation on ‘the Abstract of the Eight Literacy Giants in Tang and Song Periods’ as the most unbiased anthology, and in later years, he adored Han You and So Sik as the best two of them. Taekdang bitterly criticized the Tang’s inertial tendency of writing which was going with the stream of the classicism of Myoung Period and their ‘narrow-minded behaviors for reading’. Nevertheless, he did not necessary deny the value and significance of the antique writings themselves from Jin and Han Periods. He retroacted or expanded the range for model works in each literary style since the antique writings of Tang and Song Periods stemmed from those of Jin and Han Periods and it was essential to master the inherent writing styles in a variety of remainders in order to cultivate writing skills. Taekdang’s varied criticisms clearly show the fact that he had the antiques of Jin and Han at his fingertips, and thus lots of later writers also appreciated that he had been all clued up to ‘the Han Literary(漢書)' and 'the Historic Records(史記)’. Taekdang compiled a collection of prose, named ‘Daegauisun(大家意選)’, which had 42 literary works considered and selected as the entry works among those writings in ‘the Abstract’ by himself around the period of 1631(9th years with King Injo) and 1632(10th). And he made various remarks on them with his own literary-critical talent. Then later, his progeny collected the ‘Daegauisun’, copied only the titles, evaluations, and remarks into a book for mimeographing with ease, and called the book ‘Criticisms on Daegauisun(大家意選批評)’. Taekdang decided the order for the entry works of ‘the Eight Giants’ according to stylistic standards, and his ordering relied mostly on ‘Epitaph style(碑誌類)’, Documentary style(記文類), and ‘Statement style(送序類)’, and especially in the case of ‘Statement style(送序類)’ and ‘Epitaph style(碑誌類)’, Han You’s writings accounted for much the largest percentage. In his criticisms on the writings of the Eight Giants, Taekdang regarded the concise expressions which reveal the writer’s intention in full, the gentle and natural esthetic sense in which the reasoning and the arrangements of words is not artificial, and the changings and fluctuatings of scales and spirits as the esthetic features of the antique writings of Tang and Song Periods, discriminated from the pseudoclassical styles. And he considered those writings which euphemistically expressed satiric feelings as the major characteristics of the antiques of Tang and Song, and especially of Han You’s Statement style because he put an emphasis on the expressions of contradictory realities and one’s own opinions rather than on the vain flowing of emotions. These works of Statement style reflected the encouragements or ridicules to the other which were underlying the remorse from parting each other, present ordeals and irrationalities, or the writers’ political points of view. In the long run, he appreciated that the characteristics in writing technique materialized in the prose of the Giants included setting up topic sentences, making the front and rear sentences respond each other closely, and the crafty tricks which made the most of the ordinary letters.