성공 신화에 대한 고딕적 대항 서사: 윌라 캐더의 ｢아프로디테가 온다!｣

초록

While Willa Cather’s “Coming, Aphrodite!” has frequently been analyzed through the lenses of realism, modernism, and gender politics, its Gothic dimensions have been largely overlooked. This paper contends that the story subtly deploys Gothic conventions—such as doubling, repressed desire, and psychological disintegration—to construct a powerful counter-narrative to the dominant American success myth. Through a close examination of the triangular dynamic among Don Hedger, Eden Bower, and Caesar the dog, the narrative emerges as a modern psychological Gothic tale, wherein Hedger is haunted not by supernatural forces but by projected aspects of his own fractured self. Eden embodies a seductive externalization of Hedger’s repressed sexuality and worldly ambition, while Caesar functions as a bestial doppelgänger channeling his instinctual, id-driven impulses. Both figures confront and destabilize Hedger’s aesthetic idealism and solitary resistance to commercialization. While Hedger and Eden attain success through their respective paths, they reveal the fundamental incompleteness of human existence, ultimately leading to a kind of social and emotional death. By challenging the core tenets of the American myth of self-fulfillment through talent and hard work, the story exposes the darkness, inner division, and repressed desire that lie beneath. By foregrounding these Gothic elements, the paper uncovers how “Coming, Aphrodite!” critiques the ideological foundations of the American success myth and offers a darker, psychologically fraught counter-narrative buried beneath its seemingly realistic surface.

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