5 larceny n. pl. larcenies theft of personal property in English law replaced as a statutory
crime by theft in 1968. Derivatives
: larcener n. archaic. larcenist n. larcenous adj. Origin
: C15: from OFr. larcin, from L. latrocinium, from latron- ‘robber’.
From the words above, we can see that O. Henry uses various diction in his short story and reveals his writing style. He chooses words in detail although the
words have old origin. Actually, I also figure out another characteristic that O. Henry frequently uses: Non-standard English to illustrate the characterization of
character. For example is in the last paragraph: the use informal language to show their discrepency of social status. The usa of “doin’ ” and “nothin’ “ shows the
fact.
4.1.1.3 Figure of speech
Figures of speech are classified into two types in traditional rhetoric. They are tropes and figures. The most familiar parts of them are simile, metaphor,
metonymy, irony, climax and hyperbole. I provide the percentage of each figures in Table 4.6
Table 4.6 The Number of Figures of Speech
Sentence type Number
Percentage Simile 3
42, 7
Metonymy Irony 1
14,3 Climax 0
Hyperbole 0 Metaphora
3 42,7
Total 7 99,9
From the analysis above we can conclude that O. Henry uses complex sentence to compose his story. There are 58 40,3 complex sentences in
Furnished Room and 59 40,7 complex sentences in The Cop and The Anthem.
O. Henry uses it as dominant structure of sentence. Next finding is related to diction which O. Henry uses to convey his idea. He employs far fetched diction in
both short stories for example in Furnished Room: ‘vagrant’ that has similarity with homeless people and ‘mignonette’ represents fragrance of greenish flower. In
The Cop and The Anthem he employs ‘rigour’ which has similarity with stiffness. O. Henry choose diction ‘rigor’ than stiffness maybe because he thinks it is more
appropriate to represent the condition. The last finding correlates to figure of speech, I provide six kinds of figure of speech but in this analysis I found that
simile and metaphor dominate the story. Simile compares something with another
thing which similar in characteristic or form explicitly and metaphor tranfers an object to different form.
45
CHAPTER V CONCLUSIONS AND SUGGESTIONS
This chapter consists of two subchapters. The first subchapter presents the conclusions of the research result. The second is suggestions related to the
research that has been done.
5.1 Conclusions
After conducted the study, I can draw some conclusions related to the style in O. Henry’s short stories. It is unique because he sets complex sentence as the
dominant structure in his works, uses far fetched diction and figures of speech. Based on the calculation in simple table, I found There are 58 40,3 complex
sentences in Furnished Room and 59 40,7 complex sentences in The Cop and The Anthem.
for the figure of speech, simile and metaphor dominate the short story, I found 6 similes 31,6 and 6 metaphores 31,6 in Furnished Room
and 3 similes 42, 7 and 3 metaphores 42,7 in The Cop and The Anthem. The diction of O. Henry is complicated and it is simple sometimes. He
also uses non Standard English to shows particular condition in his works. It oftenly shows in dialogue between the characters. However, he always illustrates
such kind of condition vividly. Frequently, he potrays a life of poor and ordinary people. Moreover, his stories show us how hard the poor and ordinary people to
reach their dream or purpose. Regularly they show their despair, their sorrow and