Lady Hyegyng: A Woman Writer of Joseon Dynasty Robert M.

Kim KOR614T Lady Hyegyng, the author of the 'Memoirs' has been praised for the detailed and powerful style of her writing which records almost sixty years of her life in Joseon court including account of husband Crown Prince Sado who was put to death by his own father King Yngjo. Prince Sado's death was controversial issue even now because of its bizarre nature - which he was locked in a rice chest and forced to die of starvation/dehydration and fatigue after nine days of lockdown - and the purpose of Lady Hyegyng's writing - which was to restore her family's honor, not the vindication of her late husband's death. Lady Hyegyng presented first of four volumes of her record to reigning King Jngjo - her own son who took the crown in place of late Sado, then remaining three to her grandson King Sunjo in successive order. The first volume 'Memoir of 1795' describes Lady Hyegyng's birth and marriage to Prince Sado, and of her family members - especially her father Hong Ponghan. It was written by the request of her nephew Hong Suyng to keep them as family record since her writings including letters to her father was purposefully destroyed and thus none of them remained. The second memoir of year 1801 was presented to Lady Hyegyng's grandson King Sunjo to persuade him to reinstate her younger brother Hong Nagim's status after he was executed for the charge of having converted to Catholicism, which was banned of practice at the time. The third memoir of 1801 tells her grandson Sunjo that late King Jngjo promised Prince Sado's posthumous ascension to the throne, then she finally discloses the fully detailed account of her husband's death in the last memoir of 1805. Lady Hyegyng was married to Crown Prince Sado at the age of ten but she knew exactly what she has to do - live for the honor of family, then for the kingdom - when she was instructed by her father Ponghan before leaving for the palace. On the other hand, Ponghan who continuously failed on national exam successfully accomplishes gamble of lifetime when his daughter was finally chosen to be married to crown prince. With the title of in-law to the royal family, he was rapidly promoted in the rank of officials. Lady Hyegyng became a member of Noh-ron party after her father who was a leader of the party whereas her husband Price Sado was their nemesis Soh-ron sympathizer. This called for a predicted tragedy when ever-powerful Noh-ron plotted to rid of Soh-ron and Sado being isolated and slandered by opposing Noh-ron and even from his own wife Hyegyng.

Lady Hyegyng even tells in her memoir that she deliberately edited the letters from the King Yngjo to Sado before it reaches her husband and reported its content back to her father. Her husband was nothing more to her than a political rival/enemy than a wedded husband. She faithfully carried out her mission as acting double agent as instructions came from her father Ponghan. When Prince Sado tried to avoid his father's wrath by asking her to let him wear his son's hat who was adored by Yngjo - she refuses, at this time Sado reveals his feeling toward Hyegyng by telling her she is a scary women, that he wanted to earn his father's sympathy by wearing his son's hat, but even that she does not allow. Also when Sado was locked in the rice-chest for nine days, Lady Hyegyng does nothing to save his life. She even tells his father of Prince Sado's attempt to contact his mentor Cho Jaeho for help before he gets locked in the chest. Cho, who was also Soh-ron was executed because he supported Prince Sado. After her son Jngjo became King, Lady Hyegyng had to face another ordeal against her family since Jnjo considered her family and the Noh-ron party as real culprit for the death of his father. For this reason, she wrote additional memoirs to fight back accusations against her family and protect them from the political attack. In her writings Lady Hyegyng asserts that her husband's death was due to personal conflict between mentally-ill Sado and a Yngjo who had abnormal character, not because of her family's involvement. Her argument did proved to be effective since majority of contemporary readers of her writing believed such argument for simple feud between father and son until recent attempt to view the political circumstances at the time in a new light. So, is Lady Hyegyng can considered to be a historian? What are some of the conditions to be recognized as a historical writing? According to Haboush(1996), "historiography as practiced in Korea was written according to well-defined conventions" including "third person narration based on sources other than the writer's personal observations so as to impart objectivity and credibility to the narrative (pp.1415). Since Lady Hyegyng's records were based on her first person observation and of her own memory, her writings 'violate some of the crucial aspects' to be called historiography. The Memoir describes political situation of the era and people's lives in the palace, and women's status in fairly detailed account which called for historical value in itself. However, the majority of the content were filled up with justification for her family saying their moral integrity and loyalty to the kingdom was perfectly flawless and upright while her political enemies were described as just opposite characters. She even criticized her own husband in the memoir that he was in a serious mental condition and should be treated accordingly and her father-in-law Yngjo was also portrayed as a person with peculiar character. Not only Sado and Ynjo but Lady Hyegyng describes her mother-in-law, a biological mother to Prince Sado as a vicious woman who led her son to death.

These were some of the findings that are prohibiting the readers to consider Lady Hyegyng's memoir a historical records, and even she did not assert her own credibility by mentioning in her own writing that "Father(Ponghan) also cautioned my family not to strew the letters from the palace about the house. Thus my family gathered all my letters and, at regular intervals, washed away all that was written. Hence, none of those writings remained in my family's possession (Haboush, p.49). This reveals that when Lady Hyegyng wrote her memoir, purely her memory was the source of information. Because human memory has its limitations, the records of events should be written at the time of incident or shortly after to be reflected on later time for the accuracy of the account but Lady Hyegyng did this after decades later and relied on her memory only which defies objectivity of the article. According to the chronicles of Joseon Dynasty, Lady Hyegyng's father Ponghan failed on government exam numerous times until he reaches late age of thirty and had to use his prestigious family's influence to attain one of the lowest ranks in the public office, a tomb watcher. Even in Annals of Yngjo in November 3, 1735, mentions that Ponghan's attendance numbers in school of Snggyungwan was so low that the King himself barred him and the others from taking the government exam for at least five years. "() () ( ) , . () 2 , () 5 ." - 11 11 3 . http://sillok.history.go.kr Also the Annals of Jngjo in December 4, 1778 describes the Ponghan after his death as "a person of inferior talent who used his title of in-law to the royal family to advance in the ranks of officials ... for ten years of his regime, the whole country and people suffered." " () (). ... () () , () () . () () . 10 () () () . () () , . () , , () . , ." - 2 12 4 . http://sillok.history.go.kr

Such a dubious accounts of Ponghan's academic and his performance in public offices deserves such brutal criticism but still granted rapid promotion just because he became a in-law to the royal family, and because of this we also cannot expect much more from his personal character either. However in the memoir of Lady Hyegyng, her father Ponghan was described as a person of great scholastic knowledge and character, moral integrity, and humbleness. This seems to be overly exaggerated in favor of Lady Hyegyng's own father and her kinships. All of these historical facts are working against some of the claims for her writing's status as a historiography but why is her work so important to us? The 'Memoir' is only written work of the women writers in classical period with exact date to refer to and also states the author of the work. Another work that has almost equal status as a fine piece of literature 'Biography of Queen Inhyn' is believed to be written by a court lady, but can't be verified of its authenticity because the text itself does not reveal the name of the author. Also the 'Memoir' is one of the few example of literature that was written in Hangul, and in a manner that is praised over and over for its eloquent description of the events narrated and of its detailedness. So, where does the Lady Hyegyng stand as a writer? From the writing style and its persuasiveness, the Memoir left tremendous impact to its readers and the author of the work Lady Hyegyng should be awarded a new title 'provocateur' or a 'Demagog.' At first sight, the 'Memoir' has similar impact as a journalistic writings but because of the integrity of the author's intention or lack thereof, it should be treated as a political agenda of the past with a special consideration as a great piece of literature work. This pose a challenge to us to define what is a journalistic writing. Sometimes a journalistic writing by a certain politically inclined news media cannot be trusted, a sad fact of reality. In this sense, we can truly say Lady Hyegyng was a great journalist of the era that even influenced decision of the sovereign.

Bibliograpy NIKH (1392 - 1928). The Annals of the Chosun Dynasty. http://sillok.history.go.kr, National Institute of Korean History. Haboush, J. K. (1996). The memoirs of Lady Hyegyng: the autobiographical writings of a Crown Princess of eighteenth-century Korea. Berkeley, Univ of California Press. McCann, D. R. (1997). "The Memoirs of Lady Hyegyng: The Autobiographical Writings of a Crown Princess of Eighteenth-Century Korea. Translated and with an introduction and annotation by Jahyun Kim Haboush. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1996. 372 pp." The Journal of Asian Studies 56(04): 1114-1116.