The Purpose of Walt Whitman's Poetry Translation by Chung Ji Young

정지용의 월트 휘트먼 시 번역 작업의 목적: 일제 강점기와 해방 공간의 근본적 차이

Chung Ji Yong is a well-known poet in the Japanese Occupation Period firstly as a lyrical and traditional poet as a member of the literary journal Simunhak(Poetry Literature) along with Park Yong Chul and Kim Young Rang and later as a prominent modernist poet in the late years of the Period. He is always highly estimated as a poet of pictorial images and lyricism, but his ardor for translations, especially Walt Whitman has been neglected so far. Before him, Ju Yohan, Yi Kwang Soo, Yi Un Sang, Kim Hyung Won and many other poets and critics had been interested in Whitman's democratic ideas and his poems. Chung Ji Young also translated Whitman's three poems in the hard days of 1930s. After the Imperial Japan surrendered to the Allied forces on 15 August 1945, ending 35 years of Japanese occupation, Korea was under the American forces and Russian troops. In this critical days of Korean's debating only one korea or separated Koreas, strangely enough, Chung ji Yong fully immersed in translating Whitman's poems only for four years as an English literature professor just before being abducted by North Korean Army, while almost discarding his own poetic ability and sense of duty as a leading poet in the literary circle with only just a few exceptions. Why did Chung Ji Yong focused on the translation of Whitman's poems in this important period as a poet and intellectual in the newly independent country? He may want to warn people too much ideological conflicts or at least express his frustration through translating Whitman's poems. Until now, academic endeavors on Chung Ji Yong's poems and life are focused on his lyrical and modernistic works of the Japanese Occupation Period and naturally little interested in the days of Independence period and his true motivations on translating Whitman's poems. As a proposal, this short article can be a minor trigger for the sincere efforts of Chung Ji Yong's last days.