Review of Related Studies

7

CHAPTER II THEORETICAL REVIEW

A. Review of Related Studies

Th. Enny Anggraini in essay entitled “End Justifies the Means: The Hysteria of Witch Hunting A Socio- historical Study on Milles‟s The Crucible and Poetry‟s Tituba of Salem Village” in Phenomena Journal of Language and Literature Vol. 8 No. 2 October 2004 writes, Historical facts are renewed for being the source of the writing of many literary works. Many works have been written based on big events that happened on earth: the Great Wars – Civil War, the First World War, the Second World War, The Vietnam War-; the Great Disasters: the Holocaust, the Sinking of the Titanic, The eruption of the Krakatoa, and such kinds of events. By knowing the history of such significant, people are expected to learn something in order that good events will continue to happen and to stop bad ones from happening again 2004: 9. From the foregoing quotation, the socio-cultural historical approach is appropriate in order to analyze many works that are related with historical facts of big events which are happened on earth, such as the World War, the eruption of Krakatoa. She also explains that if human beings understand the historical facts that contain the conditions of certain time and place, they are expected to be better creatures in the future. Another quotation comes from David Pringle in www. guardian.co.uk, Sunday 19 April 2 009 entitled “Obituary: JG Ballard” that describes about the author of the novel, J. G. Ballard. He writes, Esteemed for his wayward imagination and his ability to create a distinctively Ballardian world, his fiction moved through various phases while remaining instantly recognisable. … Another decade on and he reemerged as a great novelist of the second world war experience with Empire of the Sun, shortlisted for the Booker prize and winning his widest-ever public www.guardian.co.uk, 27 July 2012. The overhead quotation describes J. G. Ballard as a great novelist who can create an inimitable world of fiction. Pringle says that J. G. Ballard has the ability to combine imaginations and experiences in order to create a fiction through vario us phases, but easily recognizable. Pringle‟s review is substantiated by J. G. Ballard‟s works about that win some awards and prizes in literature. One of his eminent works is the novel Empire of the Sun, which portrays the experiences of the Second World War in China as the inclusion of the Second Sino-Japanese War. The quotation about the novel Empire of the Sun is described by Golancz in The Guardian entitled “Empire of The SunReviews of Empire of The Sun by JG Ballard”. He writes, His new novel Empire of the Sun, however, deserves to be considered quite apart from his former work, not least because it marks a decisive break with his past reputation as essentially a science fiction writer. … Indeed, it could be said that if there is still room for a masterpiece about the Second World War, then this is it - and like other masterpieces it gains its initial effect in standing at a slightly oblique and unexpected angle to its subject matter www.guardian.co.uk, 27 July 2012. From the above quotation, the novel Empire of the Sun deserves to be a masterpiece amongst works of literature that are related with the Second World War as its theme. Even J.G. Ballard is a science-fiction writer; he can create a work that is related with the real conditions in the world. It is because he can combine between his imaginations and his experiences about the conditions of the Second World War in China as the inclusion of the Second Sino-Japanese War that he experienced in China when he was a child. Golancz says the novel Empire of the Sun by J. G. Ballard is unique because this novel has a slightly oblique and an unexpected angle to its subject matters. The last quotation comes from Exam Center of skoool.ie interactive learning. This quotation explains about the content of the novel Empire of the Sun . This quotation describes “Ballards fiction is concerned with catastrophe and dystopia - that is, the opposite of utopia. He explores the physical and mental decay of his characters in landscapes of terrible urban destruction and environmental decay ” www.skoool.ie, 30 July 2012. From this quotation, the novel Empire of the Sun has been studied by some researchers. They say th at this novel is unique because it does not like J.G. Ballard‟s other novels, this novel represents the catastrophe and dystopia, a condition when or where everything is as bad as possible it can be. This novel represents that everything is bad based on th e author‟s childhood experiences during the Second World War in China as the inclusion of the Second Sino-Japanese War.

B. Review of Related Theories