김종삼 시는 한국 현대시사에서 암시와 생략, 절제와 순수로 익히 정평이 나 있다. 이는 1950년대 한국 전쟁 상황이라는 비극적 인식 속에서 본질적 이념으로서의 기의를 상실한 채 시적 징후로서 현실을 형상화할 수밖에 없는 전후 시인들의 시대적 실어증을 내포하고 있다. 이는 김수영과 김춘수, 김종삼을 포함한 1950년대 문학인 전체에 해당하는 사안이다. 이들은 “외국어(일본어)로 사고하고 구성하고 모국어로 그것을 옮”겨야하는 불구적 창작방식의 세대였다. 유려한 리듬과 토속의 능숙한 구사를 원천적으로 제약당했던 세대가 민족 고유어나 민요를 계승할 수 없는 것은 당연한 일이었다. 박재삼이나 박용래와 같은 일부 시인을 제외하고 대부분 시인들이 모더니즘에 경사된 측면은 어쩌면 필연적이라 할 수 있다. 이 가운데서 김종삼은 비극적이고 황폐한 현실 인식, 가난과 소외와 죽음의식, 실존의 문제에 천착하면서 독자적인 시 형식을 보여준다. 불완전한 구문, 자주 급격히 끊어지는 리듬, 논리적 유추를 거부하는 생략과 비약, 여백들. 이는 ‘낡은 언어를 버리고 새로운 언어’를 찾고자 하는 시인의지이다. 세계 인간에 대한 부조리, 폐허 속에서의 부재의식, 피안-순수의 세계를 지향하고자 하는 초월적 낭만의지와 연관되며 릴케 영향 받은 후 실존주의에 대한 심취, 서양문화, 음악에 대한 경도와 연관된다. 이와같은 심취는 다시 미학적 시적 형식으로 육화된다. 1950년대 한국시 모더니즘은 1960년대에 안정적인 구도를 찾아간다고 할 수 있다. 한국시의 새로운 흐름은 소월, 만해에서 페시미즘과 토속적 초월주의, 미당의 전통설화에서의 민속주의, 청록파의 자연주의를 부정하면서 김수영, 김춘수라는 한국 모더니즘의 새로운 국면으로 접어든다. 김수영의 현실부정의 시학과 역동적 시적 주체의 문제, 김춘수의 언어실험 극단에 발생하는 도발적 이미지 충돌과 언어 본질 기능의 천착. 그 극단의 양 갈래 사이에 김종삼이 위치하는 것은 아닌가 한다. 김수영의 대사회적 삶의 태도, 김춘수의 역사허무주의 속에서 언어본질 탐구, 그 사이에 김종삼의 무정부주의적 삶의 한 단면을 생각해 볼 필요가 있다. 1960년대 한국 현대시 모더니티의 정착에서 새로움이 자아 인식, 개인의 발견, 일상적 개인의 추구라 한다면 김종삼 시는 지금까지 한국시에서 일찍이 볼 수 없었던 묘사적 ‘이미지를 통한 상징성’, 개성적 언어형식을 통한 ‘여백과 생략의 심미성’을 보여준다.

Jongsam Kim's poetry is well-known for its suggestion, omission, temperance and genuineness in Korean modern poetry history. This has postwar poets' epochal aphasia of representing reality as poetic indication deprived of significance as the essential ideology, within the tragic recognition called Korean war in the 1950s. Such is a case relevant to the entire literary men in the 1950s, including Suyeong Kim, Chunsu Kim and Jongsam Kim. They were the generation of crippled creative method that conceived, composed in foreign language (Japanese) and then put into native language. It was a natural outcome for the generation, which was fundamentally constrained from having skillful command of elegant rhythm and folkways, to unable to inherit ethnic native tongue or folk song. Except for some poets like Jaesam Park or Yongrae Park, it was some what of perforce for most poets to show sides slanted towards Modernism. Jongsam Kim among them shows original poetry form by inquiring into recognition of tragic ruined reality, awareness of poverty, alienation and death, as well as the existent issues. Defective construction, frequent sudden breaks of rhythm, omission and leap refusing rational analogy, and blanks. These are the will of the poet to 'discard old language and search for new language'. After being influenced by Rilke in relation to transcendental romantic volition of heading towards absurdity for cosmopolitans, absent consciousness in the ruins and the world of Nirvana-purity, it was related to the fascination with existentialism, western culture and the degree of music. Such fascination is incarnated again into aesthetic poetry form. It can be said that Modernism of Korean poetry in the 1950s found its stable composition by the 1960s. From Sowol and Manhae, the new flow of Korean poetry approached the new aspect of Korean Modernism with Suyeong Kim and Chunsu Kim, by denying feminism; ethnic transcendentalism; ethnicism within traditional tale of Midang; and naturalism of the Cheongrokpa. Suyeong Kim's poetry of denying reality and theme of dynamic poetic subject, Chunsu Kim's collision of provocative imagery generated from the extreme language experiment and inquiry into the essential function of language. One thinks Jongsam Kim stands in the middle of the two extremes. It is necessary to think about one slice of Jongsam Kim's anarchistic life among Suyeong Kim's anti-social attitude to life and Chunsu Kim's investigation of linguistic essence seen in Historical Nihilism. When the recency was pursuing self-perception, discovery of individuals and ordinary individual in the modernity of Korean modern poetry in the 1960s, Jongsam Kim's poetry shows depictive 'symbolism through imagery' which was never seen in Korean poetry before as well as 'aesthetic appreciation for blank and omission' through his unique linguistic form.

Jongsam Kim's poetry is well-known for its suggestion, omission, temperance and genuineness in Korean modern poetry history. This has postwar poets' epochal aphasia of representing reality as poetic indication deprived of significance as the essential ideology, within the tragic recognition called Korean war in the 1950s. Such is a case relevant to the entire literary men in the 1950s, including Suyeong Kim, Chunsu Kim and Jongsam Kim. They were the generation of crippled creative method that conceived, composed in foreign language (Japanese) and then put into native language. It was a natural outcome for the generation, which was fundamentally constrained from having skillful command of elegant rhythm and folkways, to unable to inherit ethnic native tongue or folk song. Except for some poets like Jaesam Park or Yongrae Park, it was some what of perforce for most poets to show sides slanted towards Modernism. Jongsam Kim among them shows original poetry form by inquiring into recognition of tragic ruined reality, awareness of poverty, alienation and death, as well as the existent issues. Defective construction, frequent sudden breaks of rhythm, omission and leap refusing rational analogy, and blanks. These are the will of the poet to 'discard old language and search for new language'. After being influenced by Rilke in relation to transcendental romantic volition of heading towards absurdity for cosmopolitans, absent consciousness in the ruins and the world of Nirvana-purity, it was related to the fascination with existentialism, western culture and the degree of music. Such fascination is incarnated again into aesthetic poetry form. It can be said that Modernism of Korean poetry in the 1950s found its stable composition by the 1960s. From Sowol and Manhae, the new flow of Korean poetry approached the new aspect of Korean Modernism with Suyeong Kim and Chunsu Kim, by denying feminism; ethnic transcendentalism; ethnicism within traditional tale of Midang; and naturalism of the Cheongrokpa. Suyeong Kim's poetry of denying reality and theme of dynamic poetic subject, Chunsu Kim's collision of provocative imagery generated from the extreme language experiment and inquiry into the essential function of language. One thinks Jongsam Kim stands in the middle of the two extremes. It is necessary to think about one slice of Jongsam Kim's anarchistic life among Suyeong Kim's anti-social attitude to life and Chunsu Kim's investigation of linguistic essence seen in Historical Nihilism. When the recency was pursuing self-perception, discovery of individuals and ordinary individual in the modernity of Korean modern poetry in the 1960s, Jongsam Kim's poetry shows depictive 'symbolism through imagery' which was never seen in Korean poetry before as well as 'aesthetic appreciation for blank and omission' through his unique linguistic form.

depictive imagery, symbolism, aesthetic appreciation, modernity, Modernism, ordinary individual