J. M. Synge’s Riders to the Sea and Its Korean Translation*1

Abstract

The first significant modern theatre movement in Korea arose in the early 1920s. As already indicated, since the 1920s, modern Irish drama and its theatre movement had been a major field of interest for the Korean intelligentsia and dramatists, who believed that it provided a model for the modern Korean theatre. The importation of Irish drama was systematically conducted by different groups from the Korean intelligentsia in the 1920s and 1930s, during which period many of them published articles concerning Irish drama and the modern Irish theatre movement. In this paper, the process of importation, adaptation and assimilation of Irish drama into the Korean theatre will be traced. The initial stage of this process revolved around Irish drama which was translated into Korean. Twenty Irish plays were translated during the 1920s and 1930s and some of them were produced on the Korean stage. In this chapter, a complete list of the translated Irish plays will be provided and an analysis of the culturally significant repertories will follow. A further area of discussion will focus on which examples of Irish drama were chosen and how they were altered and interpreted from a Korean perspective. The examples of Irish drama which were translated into Korean reflect the theatrical taste of the Korean intelligentsia. Another important point of this chapter is the quality of translation, which reflects the ability of the leaders of the modern Korean theatre movement both as producers and translators. Many parts of the Irish originals were misinterpreted during the process of translation, either intentionally for political reasons, or unintentionally, due to the lack of linguistic skills. As a result, the mistranslated parts destroyed the original structure of the plays. Even worse, these 'translator's intention- reflected' versions were not only published but also used as the script for performances. This meant that the Korean reader and audience were also subjected to a similar misunderstanding of modern Irish drama. Based on this observation, the other main area of discussion in this chapter is a comparison of the differences between the Irish original plays and the Korean versions and an analysis of the cultural effect which resulted from the intentional changes.