Selfish Personality Traits 1. Cunning

43 everything to get money and elevate her social status. Then, the first step to take is getting a husband. When she is invited to Amelia’s house, she finds out that Amelia’s brother, Jos Sedley, is still a single. So she makes her moves to get Jos’ and the Sedleys’ heart. Her attempt to Jos Sedley does not work. Her failure with Jos Sedley never breaks her heart, instead she directly makes some plans how to conquer the Crawleys. She sets her eyes on Rawson Crawley because she knows that Rawdon is Miss Crawley’s sweet nephew and her most probable heir. She is married with Rawdon, but she is still poor because apparently Miss Crawley does not like the marriage. She makes friend with Lord Steyne though Rawdon has warned her that Lord Steyne is cunning. Lords Steyne becomes her protector. Becky needs Lord Steyne to support her finance and to present her to high-class society. She is persistent in getting what she wants. She will do anything to be accepted by the society, so when Lord Steyne asks her to send her son to a dormitory school, she obeys him. She sends little Rawdon to Eton even with objection from Rawdon. She also commits adultery with Lord Steyne. When Rawdon is in jail, charged of his debts, she makes a lie letter that she is sick and she cannot help him. She also lies that she does not have any money to pay those debts. It is Lord Steyne himself who sets Rawdon into jail. Rawdon is free because of his sister in law’s help. He goes home and finds Becky and Lord Steyne in his bedroom. Rawdon opened the door and went in. A little table with a dinner was laid out – and wine and plate. Steyne was hanging over the sofa on which Becky sat. The wretched woman was in a brilliant full toilet, her arms and all her fingers sparkling with bracelets and rings,; and the brilliant on her breast which Steyne has given her. He had her hand in his, and was bowing over it to kiss it, when Becky started up with a faint scream as she PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI 44 caught sight of Rawdon’s white face. At the next instant she tried a smile, a horrid smile, as if to welcome her husband: and Steyne rose up, grinding his teeth, pale, and with fury in his look 537-8. Rawdon accidentally catches in the act of her infidelity. She has been a mistress of Lord Steyne, and she gets much money from him, a thousand pound sterling, more than enough to pay Rawdon’s bill. All the rings and the bracelets and the jewelries that she wears to a party are the gifts from Lord Steyne. From the discussion above, materialistic and social climber are the most prominent character of Becky. Her conducts are aimed to make her rich and elevate her social status. Her ambition, hypocrisy, cleverness, cunning, independence, and selfishness prove it. Then, after finding out that Becky is a materialist and a social climber, the question continues. What kind of society does Thackeray want his readers to know in Vanity Fair? What are the satires and how does Thackeray deliver them in his novel? These questions lead to the next discussion of this chapter.

4.2. Satires on British Society

There are two major discussions in this part, materialism and social status. As mentioned in theory of character in Chapter 2, Wellek and Warren say that the author expresses his idea and knowledge about his society in the world of literature by using language as a medium in his fictitious characters. The characters in the novel may afford interesting indications of social attitude, which is similar to the characteristics of the people in his society. In other words, character may be used to find out what kind of society at that time. In this case, PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI