Background of Study INTRODUCTION

CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION

A. Background of Study

Young-adult fiction often abbreviated as YAdult fiction or simply YA is fiction written for, published for, or marketed to adolescents and young adults, roughly ages 14 to 21. Young-adult fiction, whether in the form of novels or short stories, has distinct attributes that distinguish it from the other age categories of fiction: Adult fiction, Middle Grade Fiction, and Childrens Fiction. The majority of YA stories portray an adolescent as the protagonist, rather than an adult or a child. The subject matter and story lines are typically consistent with the age and experience of the main character, but beyond that YA stories span the entire spectrum of fiction genres. The settings of YA stories are limited only by the imagination and skill of the author. YA novels are often as short as 16000 words. Writing styles of YA stories range widely, from the richness of literary style to the clarity and speed of the unobtrusive. Despite its unique characteristics, YA shares the fundamental elements of fiction with other stories: character, plot, setting, theme, and style. 1 1 Young Adult Fiction. http:www.wikipedia.orgwikiYoung-adult_fiction.htm, accessed on March 15, 2009. In the 1950s, two novels drew the attention of adolescent readers: The Catcher in the Rye 1951, and Lord of the Flies 1954. Nowadays some writers like Stephenie Meyer born 1973: American creator of the popular vampire romance franchise Twilight and J. K. Rowling born 1965 2 are also categorized as writers of young adult fiction. Regarding the themes of Young Adult stories: “Themes in YA stories often focus on the challenges of youth, so much so that the entire age category is sometimes referred to as problem novels 3 or coming of age 4 novel. From its very beginning, young-adult fiction has portrayed teens confronting situations and social issues that have pushed the edge of then-acceptable content. Such novels and their content are sometimes referred to as edgy.” 5 YA novels currently in print—despite of ordinary themes such love, friendship and not-so-crucial problem—include content about peer pressure, illness, divorce, drugs, gangs, crime, violence, sexuality, incest, oral sex, and femalemale rape. Critics of such content argue that the novels encourage destructive or immoral behavior. Others argue that fictional portrayal of teens 2 British author, J.K. Rowling is an award winning young-adult author today and arguably the most successful. Being the author of the extremely successful and critically well-received Harry Potter series, her books have been sold in more than 400 million copies worldwide and are translated into more than 63 languages. She is also the first billionaire-author in terms of US- dollars. 3 Problem novel is a term used to refer to a sub-genre of young adult literature that deals exclusively with an adolescents first confrontation with a social or personal ill. It is dealing more with characters from lower-class families and their problems; being grittier; using more realistic language; and including dialects, profanity, and poor grammar when it fits the character and setting. 4 Coming of age is a young persons transition from adolescence to adulthood. Particularly in western societies, modern legal conventions which stipulate points in late adolescence or early adulthood most commonly 18 and 21, at which time adolescents are generally no longer considered minors and are granted the full rights of an adult are the focus of the transition. 5 Young-Adult Fiction, http:en.wikipedia.orgwikiYoung-adult_fiction, accessed on January, 24, 2010. addressing difficult situations and confronting social issues helps readers deal with real-life challenges. Debate continues regarding the amount and nature of violence and vulgarity appropriate in young-adult fiction. In recent years, however, YA fiction has been increasingly treated as an object of serious study by childrens literature critics. A growing number of young-adult-fiction awards recognize outstanding works of fiction for adolescents. Luna by Julie Ann Peters is a novel that considered to be a young adult novel. Nevertheless, even only as a young adult novel Luna offers a serious theme. It offers a story with a topic which rarely dealt with in young adult fiction. The novel is a complicated novel dealing with complex issues and characters. It may be the first young adult novel to really deal with transgender issues, and as such, it offers an important opportunity for new dialogue and discussion. 6 Since that Transgender and transsexual-centric fiction is a rare subset of LGBT 7 literature. Most books published by and about transgender and transsexual people are non-fiction, such as: autobiographies, critiques or general LGBT or queer studies texts. 8 Luna by Julie Ann Peters is nominated for 19 awards since its publication in 2004, and won most of the honors including as a Best Book Award for Young 6 www.Teenreads.com0316733695.asp.htm accessed on March 15, 2009. 7 LGBT or GLBT is an initial referring collectively to Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender people. 8 Transgender. http:www.wikipedia.orgwikiTransgender_and_transsexual_fiction.htm , accessed on March 15, 2009. Adult Literature by An American Library Association. Luna is the story of transgender high school senior Liam O’Neil Luna, a girl trapped inside a male body, and his younger sister Regan, who has been his only confidante throughout their childhood and teenage years. Liam O’Neil spurs his metamorphosis forward by calling himself Lia Marie or Luna and exploring feminine clothes anywhere and anytime he has a chance. The novel is told from the point of view of fifteen- year-old Regan. She struggles with the secret that her older brother, Liam, is a transsexual, who wants to transition 9 and live as a girl named Luna. Liam adopts the name Luna, which means moon, to reflect the fact she can only show herself as a girl at night. The story portrays a young boy who feels anxious about living in his true identity because there were too many occurrences that pressure his passion to fulfill his basic needs—to be loved and accepted for who he she is. This book was a very touching story, not only about transgender people but also about the relationship between siblings in a dysfunctional family. The family has the typical father with clear cut gender role ideas, pushing his son to participate in sports when he has never shown an interest in them. For 18 years Liam pretending that he is a normal guy in front of his sexist father, while his mother turns out has known about Liam since he was child. Since she can’t face up to deal with the reality, so she keeps herself busy by taking drug and pretending nothing peculiar is happening in her family. Liam struggle a dilemmatic condition between wanting to please his father—that demand him to take his gender role as a 9 The process of changing from one gender presentation to another is often called transition. masculine man—and fulfilling his desire to be transgender, or even to be a transsexual. 10 As a human, Liam indifferently born as an ordinary man. Even so, there are many occurrences that eventually lead him into switching his identification in sex typing, which at first has to be male, but he chooses to be a girl. This novel, Luna, has a main character that is very interesting to be analyzed through the point of view of psychoanalysis regarding to his sex-typing and identification process. With the theory, there can be found the cause of Liam’s changing direction in identification which exactly has relation to his condition as a transgender. Therefore, in this research the writer will try to analyze Luna’s main character with psychoanalysis theory by Sigmund Freud in order to unveil Luna’s main character psychological aspect.

B. Focus of the Research