[K-Women Talk] For Whom Was the Romance Novel Guunmong Written?

A Strong Woman Who Raised Kim Manjung
Haepyeong Yoonssi, Lover of Romance Novels
Her Free-Spirited Humanity Reflected in the Story

Even now, it is truly an entertaining story. The male protagonist meets eight women, engaging in fierce love and conflicts with each of them. Among them are a princess, the daughter of the Dragon King, and an assassin from an enemy country. The women actively move and fight to win his love. Eventually, they all become happily married couples, enjoying all kinds of worldly honors and wealth to the fullest. Although the ending reveals that all of this was a dream and concludes with a sense of futility, Guunmong is by no means a novel meant to teach a moral lesson. Rather, it uses such an ending as a way to deflect criticism, and the true enjoyment and reason for reading Guunmong lie in the free-spirited and worldly desires portrayed up until that point.

The author of Guunmong, Seo Po Kim Manjung, said he wrote it "to ease his mother's leisure and worries." One wonders what kind of mother would have been pleased to read such a work.

However, Kim Manjung’s mother, Haepyeong Yoonssi, lived a life full of hardship. In 1636, during the Byeongjahoran (the Qing invasion), the Qing army occupied Ganghwado Island. Many people died at that time, including Haepyeong Yoonssi’s husband Kim Ik-gyeom and her mother-in-law Seo, who both took their own lives. Haepyeong Yoonssi did not follow them because of her three-year-old eldest son Kim Manki and the second child in her womb. The child who lost his father before birth was born ten months later, and that was Kim Manjung.

Although the family became renowned for their loyalty and righteousness, Haepyeong Yoonssi became a widow alone, and the children became orphans. Even now, but especially in the Joseon Dynasty, children without fathers were ridiculed and pointed at for bad behavior due to their lack of a father.

Therefore, Haepyeong Yoonssi devoted herself to educating her sons. She obtained study books and taught them, even personally instructing them in texts like Sohak, Sidae, and Saryak. Fortunately, both sons lived up to their mother’s desperate hopes and passed the civil service examinations, with Kim Manjung even achieving the top rank. Later, Kim Manki’s daughter became Queen Ingyeong, the first queen consort of King Sukjong. However, this honor did not last long. Queen Ingyeong died young from smallpox. Afterwards, Sukjong married Queen Inhyeon but favored Jang Heebin. Kim Manjung became entangled in the ensuing political struggles and, despised by Sukjong, was exiled and died there.

Yet, despite such harsh political realities, Kim Manjung wrote Guunmong. The world of politician Kim Manjung and the world of Guunmong are so different that it is hard to believe they came from the same person. Was the claim that he wrote the novel for his mother just an excuse, or was it the truth?

In fact, reading novels was one of the main hobbies of women in the Joseon era. However, social perception was not favorable because the stories were full of worldly themes like love and adventure. Nevertheless, novels were very popular.

Kim Manjung wrote Guunmong in Hangul. Since he studied under his mother, he was likely proficient in using Hangul. Moreover, the fact that a nobleman like him could write such an intense love story as Guunmong suggests he had read many romance novels. Who, then, supplied Kim Manjung?who had no sisters?with so many romance novels? It must have been his mother, Haepyeong Yoonssi. She was a strong woman who managed the household and raised her sons after her husband’s death, yet she also enjoyed reading romance novels freely in her spare time and shared them with her sons. Haepyeong Yoonssi may not have been a perfect noble lady, but she was truly human and ultimately left behind the work Guunmong.

Lee Han, History Writer