The Chaste Lady Buried as a Man - The Banghallimjeon Read through Confucian Virtues

Banghallimjeon is a novel from late Joseon period focusing on the family life of Bang Gwanju, who was assigned female at birth but lived his entire life as a man. By identifying him as transgender male, this paper essays to reevaluate the role of Confucian values depicted in the novel. As opposed to a female who was unwillingly forced into a life of a man, Gwanju actively wanted to pursue life as a man and his loyal adherence to traditional Confucian values allowed him to live the life he wanted. Gwanju is depicted as an ideal man in his filial piety towards his parents, and loyalty towards his Emperor and country. Furthermore, a new interpretation of “Differentiation in Husband and Wife 夫婦有別”emerging during the Joseon dynasty, which centers not on the different roles between man and woman but rather the common goal of chastity and sexual loyalty towards one another, renders Gwanju the best of husbands and the best of biological women simultaneously. His virtues as a transgender man are not only officially recognized by the emperor of Ming, but is later approved by the Heavenly Emperor himself, as his transgender form and ensuing lack of lasciviousness is considered atonement enough for him to return to his male form in the afterlife. Although Banghallimjeon has its limits as a feminist novel, it can be read as a conscious effort on the anonymous author’s side as an active plea for acceptance of transgender life in traditional Joseon through the protagonist’s loyalty to Confucian virtues.