튀르크 전설 ‘만쿠르트(Mankurt)’의 원형(元型)과 스토리텔링의 변용을 통해 본 중앙아시아의 정체성 모색

Abstract

It is true that the legends and myths are great cultural assets of humanity and treasure houses contained unique emotions and deep wisdom of each nation. It is because they are the tales of getting sympathy and inspiration from everyone as well as a source of national spirit looking for something new from the old. Chingiz Aytmatov is one of those writers who regard with respect the heritage of peoples condensed in legends and myths. Various forms of national cultural heritage are reworked artistically in his works. Such a theme as “Mankurt”, recreated from one of the old stories that his grandmother had told him from the Kirghiz national epic Manas, becomes a cornerstone for him to expand the possibility of its transformation in storytelling as well as to broaden his artistic horizons in a variety of genres. Therefore, it is not an exaggeration that this paper, dealing with the aspects of the theme “Mankurt” and its transfiguration as well as the method utilizing it as an archetype to express their own point of view for the Central Asian artists, takes multi-layered narratives and imagination in their arts as a reference and focal point. The story from an archetype is a result of the process of preserving tradition, recreation, and transfiguration. As is revealed in the legend of “Mankurt”, which connects Chingiz Aytmatov‘s novel And the Day is Longer Than a Century and Khodzakuli Narliyev’s film Mankurt with the heroic epic Manas, to examine an evolution of the storytelling of the tale modified in a variety of genres provides an opportunity exploring the relationship between oral literature and various media. This effort will contribute to escalate the base of the humanities and visual arts study of Central Asia since it investigates the relationship of an archetype and its modifications, which has not been properly studied so far, despite of the fact that the term “Mankurt” is already incorporated into a common noun in today’s media. In addition, it will be one of the axes to understand the orientation and the world view of the Central Asian artists, having tried to represent the voice of people in the Soviet as well as the Post-Soviet era.