The next review will be on Dahat’s work in revealing the messages of Thomas Hardy’s Jude the Obscure. It is the tragic story of Jude, a working-class
man who aspires to be a clergy but is thwarted by the social system and his entanglement with woman and also about his love affair with his own cousin that
causes trouble and misery due to the social disapproval. This study is different from Purnami’s in which it applies the sociocultural-historical approach since the
study deals with the sociocultural-historical context of the novel that was written during the Victorian age. Therefore, Dahat also gives the review on Victorian
society in her undergraduate thesis. The first analysis about the main character’s description show that Jude
Fawley is actually honest, compassionate, honorable, hard working, persistent, and ambitious. He undergoes internal and external conflicts. His internal conflicts
lay on his personalities as a conventional, religious, and traditional Victorian that leads him to his ambition to be a clergy. However, he immediately turns to be
skeptical and embittered about his conviction by the influence of Sue Bridehead. In the other words, the internal conflict of the main character is the collision
between Jude’s intellectual and emotional sides. Meanwhile, the external conflicts are shown through his conflict with the society that disapproves his love affair
with his cousin. It means that it is the conflict between individual and society. The analysis of the main character and his internal and external conflicts
recited in the story enable Dahat to reveal the message. According to her, it is revealed that Hardy’s Jude the Obscure tries to suggest a refinement of Victorian
social system from the snobbish, rigid, and orthodox social system into a PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI
democratic and liberal one. Besides, the novel can be seen as a criticism toward the snobbery, rigidity, orthodoxy, hypocrisy and prudery of Victorian social
system. Learning about the two review studies above, the writer then states that
this undergraduate thesis will not be totally similar to the previous studies. Unlike both the reviews that convey only one message, this undergraduate thesis will try
to convey any possible messages revealed through the analysis of the main character and his conflicts in the novel under study. Another thing that
distinguishes this study with the other two is the type of the novel. Both the previous studies deployed the adult novel, while this study deploys children novel
to be analyzed. The writer, therefore, tries to reveal messages that are not only appropriate for adult but also children.
B. Review of Related Theories
1. Theory of Character and Characterization Characters are usually the key to a writing and become the simplest place
to start a story. It should be noticed at first that characters are not the same as people. People are in life, while characters are in fiction. However, characters are
very ‘life-like’ so that when you read about them, you will feel that you know them like a person in life Grenville, 1998: 35-36.
An author has provided the characters with motivation which can be defined as sufficient reason to behave as they do. The readers then are asked to
understand these characters and their motivation. The motivation itself can be PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI
distinguished into two: specific motivation and basic motivation. Specific motivation is his or her immediate reason, perhaps unconscious, for any particular
speech or act, whereas, basic motivation is an aspect of his or her general character Stanton, 1965:17.
Characters can be categorized into vary types. Roger B. Henkle, for instance, in his book Reading the Novel 1981:82 differs characters into major
and minor character. Major character main character is the most important in the story. His role is significant so that the story is about this character who appears
from the beginning to the end of the story. This character draws our fullest attention because he or she performs a key of structural function; with whom we
build expectations and desires. While, minor character only performs a more limited function in the story. This character may be less sophisticated so that his or
her responses to the experience are less common complex and interesting. Other types of characters are introduced by E.M. Forster in his book
Aspects of the Novel as quoted by Roberts and Jacobs in Fiction: An Introduction
to Reading and Writing 1989: 120-122. It is mentioned that there are two types
of characters those are round and flat character. Round characters are usually the major figure in a story. They have many realistic traits and are relatively fully
developed by the author. They are often called hero or heroine. Round characters posses many individual and unpredictable human traits. Since they demonstrate
their capacity to change and grow, they may be considered as dynamic. Therefore, a round character stands out and totally identifiable within the class, occupation,
or circumstances in which she or he included. Flat characters, otherwise, are PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI
usually minor characters although not all minor characters are flat. They are undistinguishable from their class or group. We understand little about their traits
and lives. Unlike the round characters who are dynamic, this type of character is static since they are not developed and do not change or grow.
The term stock characters is also found in this theory to show the type of character who performs in the repeating situations and have many common or
outstanding traits for examples are the clown, the revenger, the foolish boss, the macho male, etc. They are given the label stereotype because they all seem to be
cast in the same mold. Authors use many different ways to convey information about characters
in fiction through the methods of characterizing which is often called characterization. Grenville states:
“Characterization is all the things writers do to build up the characters they want. Characterization is the process that
transforms real- life people into characters in fiction 1998: 36.”
M. J. Murphy’s Understanding Unseens 1972: 161-173 includes the theory of characterization and he proposes nine methods to disclose the characters.
Below are those nine methods: a. Personal description
The character is personally described by using the appearance skin color, hair, eyes, nose, hands, and the other parts of the body and clothes how she or he
wears the cloth and what kind of cloth she or he wears. PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI
