This study is to inquire into the carnivalistic characteristic of Shin, Chae Ho’s novels after his exile by making his novels as object of study, such as An iron hammer of the King Ilmok, One-Hundred-Year-Old Old Monk’s Story About A Beauty, Dream Heaven, Fierce Battle of Dragon to Dragon. In these novels, some rhetoric techniques are shown markedly, such as irony, a fantasy, a destruction of language, an expletives, which contribute to realize a carnivalistic world aimed at a dissolution and a subversion of the actual world.
He does not attempt to create a great hero anymore. Through setting an ironical situation, he makes Gungye and Old Monk disclose by themselves that Gungye is not ‘Miri’ and Old Monk is not ‘Ogonghwasang’, by which his novels reach a comedy. In addition, there is no person who leads them to a world of active awakening. It is possible to say that these qualities are an active message to inspire the characters to find a method or a way of seeking their own judgement and identity. And the relation of King and people, master and slave, actualities and religion, life and death is subversed, and also the establishment of enlightenmental, the didactic value system such as the good triumphing over the evil is delayed and subversed.
It is Hanom that is opening a journey for self-rehabilitation and salvation which Gungye and Old Monk did not accomplish. In view of the narrative method, menippea satires take place, such as life and death, self and nonself, paradise and hell, cross between past and present, and Hanom’s existing status in the form of one and various being at the same time. These contribute to nullify the values wrapped up sacredly in actual world, to break off the oppressive realities, and to embody the a multi-voiced world. The narratives do not open the world of reconciliation easily, and also jump into the world of nirvana hurriedly. Hanmon continues his journey with tears and grief, experiencing a catharsis of self-liberation and subversion by overcoming his hardships.
In Fierce Battle of Dragon to Dragon, Shin, Chae Ho renews the traditional mask play which led people to a unity, and then recomposes it into a field in which people line up against the world of oppression. Satirizing the ruling powers, he disorganizes a system of normalized order and a structure of high and low with people. However, not ending up in the situation that the paradise, which is a world of Miri, and Dragon and the hell are reversed, this behavior of collapse drags and satirizes cheerfully their contradictions. Though the characters mock and ignore each other, the relationship between them results in a potential one by which they may step into a carnival of laugher. Their worlds rest on a circulative relation of subversion and destruction.
Consequently, the awakening which Gungye and Old Monk did not attain is attained by the journey of self-salvation by Hanom, which come to a denouement, a field of great harmony and also great unification. In conclusion, the novels of Shin, Chae Ho are not fragmented, but are connected organically in a carnivalistic outlook on world which denies a completion, recomposes and subverts the actual world.