위선과 편견 그리고 삶의 비극 - 필립 로스의 『인간의 오점』을 중심으로

• 영문명: Hypocrisy, Prejudice, and Tragedy of Life in Philip Roth"s The Human Stain
• 발행기관: 한국아메리카학회
• 저자명: 장정훈(Jung-hoon Jang)
• 간행물 정보: 『미국학논집』제36집 3호, 256~279쪽, 전체 24쪽
• 주제분류: 인문학 > 기타인문학
• 파일형태: PDF
• 발행일자: 2004.12.01

영문 초록

  Philip Roth(1933~) satirizes an aspect of the political scene in post-World War Ⅱ society in The Human Stain: the focus being the fever of political correctness in the 1990s. Roth explores the relationship between the public and private life of people in America. In the novel, the president Clinton-Monica Lewinsky scandal is the backdrop for the virtual arraignment of classics professor Coleman Silk. The desire for retribution on the campus of Athena College supposedly parallels the shocking expression in 1998 of a lynch-mob mentality aimed at cleansing the White House.
  Through the narrative voice of Nathan Zuckerman we are shown, through a long flashback, Silk"s former life. Coleman is not Jewish and he is not white. He is a light-skinned black man. Coleman made the decision to pass as a white man at age twenty-six. He spends his entire life living a lie in order to avoid discrimination, His wife does not know he is black, and he becomes estranged from his family once they discover that he is trying to pass as a white man. Perhaps Coleman Silk"s guilt is shown when he chooses to deny his roots, but Silk"s original goal was to live as an individual, freely.
  Coleman Silk, is victimized twice over by political correctness. First his academic career is ruined when he uses the word "spooks"(meaning ghosts) to describe two students, who never show up in class. Though he does not even know they are blacks, he is accused of racism, and when he refuses to dignify this preposterous accusation with an apology, none of his colleagues spring to his defense. The irony is that a black man thought by the world to be Jewish is publicly disgraced for uttering the word "spook" in its correct context. Secondly, Silk(now a widower) is excoriated for sexual harassment when he enters into an affair with a female janitor, Faunia Farley, at the college. Faunia is an illiterate, tragic young woman, half Silk"s age, whose children died in a fire and whose estranged husband, a deranged Vietnam veteran, constantly threatens her. Since Coleman is no longer associated with the college, one might think he can do as he pleases with another consenting adult. Instead, the morality police, led by the trendy young Parisian Chair of the Languages and Literature Department, Delphine Roux, are out to get him.
  In conclusion, Roth ridicules the prevailing tyrannies of political correctness on social problems. Roth gives the reader the chance to reflect on his or her own life by way of the experiences of a character such as Silk, and leaves a great challenge of how to reconcile race and social class in the early twenty-first century. As a writer, Roth examines the social health of America in his fiercely intelligent way.

목차

Ⅰ. 들어가기
Ⅱ. 사회의 위선과 편견
Ⅲ. 실크와 파니아의 계층을 초월한 사랑
Ⅳ. 파괴자, 델펀 렉스(Delphine Roux)와 팔리
Ⅴ. 나오기
인용 문헌
Abstract

키워드

필립 로스 『인간의 오점』 인종 사회계충 콜먼 실크 정치적 공정성 빌 클린턴과 모니카 르윈스키의 섹스 스캔들 Philip Roth The Human Stain Race Social Class Coleman Silk Political Correctness Bill Clinton-Monica Lewinsky Scandal