This paper aims at investigating how early poems of Rho Cheon Myong were inclined towards new trends and embraced a modern mentality. First of all, I agree with many scholars' consideration of the poetic world of Rho, which has been regarded as "aesthetics of solitude and nostalgia. Under this agreement, this paper is divided into three sections: First, consideration of tradition and aesthetics of things Korean; second, aesthetics of nostalgia, and passive recognition of reality; third, realistic solitude, reception of women's lives and their suffering are discussed. The main texts of this paper are early works such as 『Sanholim』, 『Changbyun』.
First of all, in the first chapter, 'consideration of tradition and aesthetics of things Korean' I argue that Rho expresses Korean traditional things aesthetically. Poems of things Korean described from Rho's own experiences, through poetic temperance, sing the poets' attachment to the Korean traditional customs and also illuminate her national pride.
Second, in the second chapter, 'aesthetics of nostalgia, and passive recognition of reality' I assert that the poetic world of Rho expresses nostalgic aesthetics with her own linguistic sense of Korea's unique language. Rho describes Korean people's hometowns lyrically, not just by a simple figuration of the private recollection of her childhood, but also by giving common sympathy to Koreans. Although Rho's emotional attitude to regress to the past was criticized as a passive recognition of reality considering the reality of that time, I think it is a poetic response.
Third, in the third chapter, realistic solitude, the reception of women's lives and their suffering, I review Rho's family background, which created her solitude. When she was a teenaged girl, her parents died, so she left her hometown to go to a city, which naturally affects her poetic world. This paper, however, focuses on a solitude as a pioneering female poet as well as concentrates on one as an individual. Although Korean modernization was being achieved, male dominated values controlled the general lifestyle and moreover, in a male-centered literary world, Rho must have been lonely in her struggle to make her voice heard. The conflict between this established prejudice and self-consciousness as a pioneering female poet causes her loneliness. It is not difficult to presume that Rho's life involved much tolerance of the unfair social construct, which definitely led to her loneliness.
Despite of the limitations in analyzing Rho's whole poetic world through her early poems, one can recognize that her early poems express Korean traditional beauty and Rho created aesthetics of nostalgia as modern prosody. Rho's poetic subjects are too melancholic towards the past and lack realistic recognition but considering the situation of that era, I think it is a poetic response. Also we have to understand that as a pioneering female poet of the early modern era, she had much of a burden to overcome in the limitations of reality. However, Rho tolerated social barriers and expressed her passion as a female poet. I think this aspect of Rho must be highly revered.