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thought, and wider perspectives in examining things. By writing children’s book with different patterns, Pratchett has broken the
pattern of normality in children’s book. He made the book as the medium to tell
the children that there is no hierarchy in the system of thought, so that children are free to think with various perspectives. At the end of the day, the children will not
easily swallow the label of good or bad, because every ‘good’ can be bad, and
every ‘bad’ can turn into something good. Although the story simply involves witches, heroes, fairyland, and magic,
it does not mean that the story is only for children. The younger readers or even the adults can take it as an entertainment due to the adventure, imaginary world,
the plot, and the satirical thoughts within the text. It is safe to say that this book is merely a children story. It contains wisdom, provides alternative meaning, and
shows simple ideas that may have been forgotten. It also shakes the binary opposition, for it breaks the stereotype about the heroed and the witches as in
classical children’s literature.
B. Focus of the Research
As the time goes by, many authors of children’s literature try to escape the
pattern that had been used by the authors of classic children’s literature.
Nowadays, the authors of conventional children’s literature use the elements of
stories as a wea pon to grind the readers’ way of thinking, so that the readers will
have various perspectives in seeing things. With different points of view, strange images, unusual plot, and mature theme, the authors consciously or
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unconsciously introduce the readers to deconstructive children’s literature. It
goes parallel with what Derrida has explained Sarup 1993:44 that deconstruction is about reversal. Deconstruction is not simply breaking the binary opposition.
Deconstructive text comes with gasps so that the readers have to fill it. At the end, after they have filled the gasps, the readers then have different interpretations
depend on the horizon and knowledge. To be parallel with that, the aim of this research is to convey what has been deconstructed in a text and how those things
are deconstructed. As the object of the research is deconstructive children’s literature, the
researcher takes deconstruction literary criticism as the foundation of thinking to analyze The Wee Free Men
by British children’s books author, Terry Pratchett. This research aims at revealing the conventional images that are deconstructed,
and how the author deconstructs them. The researcher uses Deconstruction literary criticism to observe the revelation of the conventional images in particular
characters in children’s literature. In this research, the researcher only analyzes
one element in a literary work, the new images of some particular characters: the heroes and the witches. The researcher seeks no more to deconstruct the text since
the text has deconstructed itself. The researcher only conveys what part is deconstructed and how the author deconstructs it.
This research examines the characters of witch and hero using deconstruction literary criticism, as The Wee Free Men does not show the stigma
of witch and hero as they were described in conventional fairy tales. Even though there are other characters in the novel that have different stigma, the researcher
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only chooses the hero and witch characters because heroes and witch are the most common characters that carry the label of good and bad vividly. The heroes and
witches in the novel are also unique characters. The novel uses unusual images of heroes and witches, so that it puts unusual figure as the hero and sees the witches
as the good character. The strange images then break the logocentrism. Since the researcher desires to examine that, Deconstruction literary theory is the most
suitable theory to analyze the literary work. Deconstruction literary criticism puts its biggest concern of the gasp within
the text. Instead of seeing a text as fixed-meaning work, it sees the text as a work that has gasps within, so that the readers are free to fill it according to their
experience in life and their horizon. The author of the text is put aside in seeking the interpretation of the text. The interpretation itself
depends on the readers’ frame of references Peck and Coyle, 2002:215. Deconstruction is not a criticism
to seek for a structure or pattern in a text, but instead, it looks for the spots where the text contradicts
the ‘truth’, so that the text ends up deconstructing itself. By showing the faltering form of the text, the text then is failed become one unified-
meaning work. As a result, the text may become multi interpreting piece of work.
C. Formulation of the Problem
