Places of Initiation in Yun Heunggil’s House of Twilight

Abstract

This article deals with one of Yun Heunggil’s (b. 1942) novels, The House of Twilight (1970). The purpose of this article is to depict the child narrator’s process of initiation during the Korean War (1950-1953) in relation with two particular places in Jeongeup, a city in North Jeolla Province. Accompanied by a child named Gyeongju, the child narrator pays visits to an iron foundry and Gyeongju’s tavern house. Against the backdrop of these two spatial settings, the narrator interacts for the first time with the traumatic social impact of the War. He is introduced to the reality of death by Gyeongju’s recollection of her family’s trauma and through initiation into her sadistic games. Further analyzed in the article, these places, along with their ambivalent connotations, anticipate the narrator’s maturation.