CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION
1.1 Background of the Study
Literature is a form of creative process of authors who convey their expression to their literary work. Almost all of the author expresses his or her
feeling and emotion in a literary work whether an author is sad, happy, or angry. According to Welek and Warren 1997:“Literature represents life and
most of it talks about social reality that describes tradition problems and norms”.
Literary works is divided into various genres. Poetry and prose are two familiar genres. The other of literary works is play or drama. According to
Zardan 2000: 52, literary works are the result of literature like prose, poetry and play. They have relation and great influence on human life. Sometimes
literary works tell existence of the author or people around him or her which is proper to write.
Buried Child is a play by Sam Shepard. This play was published in 1979. Buried Child tells about the family who altered permanently by their
secret which becomes a growing moral cancer to them, leaving each impotent in their own way. The play took place on Dodges house. For about thirty
years ago, the farm was fertile and prosperous. Dodge and Halie did not have a wonderful marriage, however. Things took a turn for the worse when Halie
became pregnant with someone else. It suggested that Tilden is the father. The evidence to support this includes the fact that the baby was small, and that
Tilden would sing to it and take it for long walks all day, just talking to it and treating it as his own.
Dodge would not allow this abomination, things that Dodge really hates to grow up and live in his family, so he drowned it, and buried it in some
undisclosed location in the backyard. The entire family made a pact to keep this family secret. They live under a cloud of guilt. In the end Dodge who
confesses the family’s secret. Unable to live with the guilt any longer, he admits all the sordid details of incest and murder. Then, just before he quietly
died, he left the farm to Vince, his grandson who, it is assumed, would try to rebuild the family’s shattered legacy.
Based on the reason above, the writer analyzes intrinsic elements by using structural approach, focusing on the protagonist character, conflicts and
setting of place and time that related to the conflict. It is the reason why the writer chooses “Dodge’s Conflicts described in Sam Shepard’s Buried Child
as the title.
1.2 Statement of Problem
Kategori