27 Literature published in 1971. The Critical Approaches which are introduced by
Rohrberger and Woods, Jr are The Formalist Approach, the Biographical Approach, the Sociocultural-Historical Approach, the Mythopoeic Approach, and the
Psychological Approach. According to Rohrberger and Woods, Jr a critical approach to literature necessitates an understanding of its nature, function, and positive values.
Furthermore, Rohrberger and Woods, Jr. 1971 state that “one must know what literature is, how to read it, and how to judge it” p. 3. Moreover, Rohrberger and
Woods, Jr. believe that it is necessary to use the critical approaches, which consist of five approaches, in order to understand a literary works.
In this study, the writer uses Freud’s psychoanalytic theory as the main approach. Freud composed that humans have three elements of personality: the id, the
ego and the superego. Psychological approach is used to answer research questions formulated in chapter I as the problem formulations. This approach can help the
writer to understand the main characters’ personality and the literal meaning of the decision to commit suicide. The psychological approach is also useful for the writer
to find the extrinsic aspects of the novel or the true meaning. The psychological approach helps the writer to interpret the psychological aspect of the main character
in the novel. The character is analyzed to draw the clear lines to the understanding of character psychology.
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3.3 Method of the Study
The method used in the study was library research. There are two kinds of sources were used; the primary and the secondary. The primary source was Paulo
Coelho’s novel entitled Veronika Decides to Die. The secondary sources were books and articles on theories and approach used in the analysis.
The research was conducted in several steps. The first step was to select a literary work that was going to be analysed. In this step the writer chose Paulo
Coelho’s Novel entitled Veronika Decides to Die. The second step was having a thorough reading of the novel for several times, in order to have a better
understanding of the story and the subject that is going to be analyzed. It helped the writer in marking the main points of the content which was used to find the
significant elements. The third step was deciding the topic to be discussed and formulating the problems related to the topic. The fourth step was collecting the
secondary sources, theories and approach, related to the topic or problems that would be analysed. The secondary data were from some books and online references. The
next step was applying the theories and approach to answer the problem formulation. The approach and theories were used to help the writer in analyzing the novel based
on the two problem formulations. The last steps were drawing conclusion based on the result of the analysis and giving some suggestions to the future researchers who
want to analyse Coelho’s Veronika Decides to Die.
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CHAPTER IV
ANALYSIS
In this chapter, the writer tries to answer the questions formulated in the problem formulation. This chapter is divided in two parts. The first part deals with
how Veronika, the main character of Coelho’s Veronika Decides to Die, is described. In this part the writer will describe Veronika’s characteristics. In the second part, the
writer will analyse the literal and true meanings of Veronika’s decision to commit suicide as seen in Coelho’s Veronika Decides to Die.
4.1 Characteristics of Veronika, the main character of Coelho’s “Veronika Decides to Die”
Characters are the central point of the readers’ interest. Each character has a different role in making the novel more interesting and dramatic. Coelho’s Veronika
Decides to Die involves some major characters such as Veronika, Mari, Zedka, Eduard, and Dr. Igor. Veronika is the main character who is the focus of the story and
the analysis of this study. Murphy 1972 states nine methods of characterization that can be used to
understand a character deeply, they are personal description, characters as seen by other characters, speech, past life, conversation of other characters, direct comment of
