Degree of Powerfulness of the Main Character in Colferâs the Land of Stories: The Wishing Spell.

(1)

Universitas Kristen Maranatha ii

ABSTRACT

Dalam skripsi ini, saya membahas degree of powerfulness dari tokoh Evil Queen. Dia adalah salah satu tokoh utama dalam novel berjudul The Land of Stories: The Wishing Spell, yang dikarang oleh Chris Colfer. Dalam pembahasan ini, saya menggunakan Stylistics sebagai landasan teori utama. Stylistics merupakan sebuah studi tentang gaya berbahasa. Teori spesifik yang digunakan adalah Functional Grammar yang berfokus pada ideational meaning, yaitu transitivity. Lebih lanjut dikatakan bahwa terdapat tujuh peran partisipasi dalam proses material, yaitu agent, force, instrument, medium-initiator, beneficiary or recipient, medium-target, dan medium, sesuai urutan dari yang paling powerful sampai dengan paling powerless.

Sebagai hasil pembahasan, didapati bahwa kehidupan Evil Queen diceritakan dalam dua bagian. Di bagian yang pertama, Evil Queen digambarkan sebagai tokoh yang sangat powerful, di mana dia berusaha untuk membebaskan Mira, kekasihnya. Di bagian yang kedua, dia digambarkan sebagai tokoh yang tidak terlalu powerful, ketika dia mengetahui bahwa pria yang dicintainya meninggal.

(2)

Universitas Kristen Maranatha iii

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ... i

ABSTRACT ... ii

TABLE OF CONTENTS ... iii

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION ... 1

Background of the Study ... 1

Statements of the Problem ... 4

Purpose of the Study ... 4

Methods of Research ... 4

Organization of the Thesis ... 4

CHAPTER 2: THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK ... 6

CHAPER 3: DEGREE OF POWERFULNESS OF THE MAIN CHARACTER IN COLFER’S THE LAND OF STORIES: THE WISHING SPELL ... 11

CHAPTER 4: CONCLUSION ... 38

BIBLIOGRAPHY ... 42

APPENDICES: Table 1. Clauses with the Evil Queen as participant ... 43

Table 2. Total of participant roles of the Evil Queen’s first stage of life ... 52

Table 3. Clauses with the Evil Queen as an agent ... 52

Table 4. Total of participant roles of the Evil Queen’s second stage of life ... 58

(3)

Universitas Kristen Maranatha 1

CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION

1.1Background of the Study

In this thesis I would like to analyze the degree of powerfulness of a character in the novel The Land of Stories: The Wishing Spell by Chris Colfer. Colfer has written a lot of novels including Struck by Lightning, which was adapted into a movie. His novel The Land of Stories: The Wishing Spell was released on July 17, 2012 as the first part of The Land of Stories series, which consists of four novels; the other three are The Land of Stories: The Enchantress Returns, The Land of Stories: A Grimm Warning, and the last one is The Land of Stories: Beyond the Kingdoms.

The Land of Stories: The Wishing Spell has received a lot of praises. According to New York Times, this novel is a best-seller novel. In addition, on October 10, 2015, the novel was rated 4.7 out of 5 stars by 653 reviewers on amazon.com. Moreover, at the same time, goodreads.com, where people can see books’ recommendations and leave or read book reviews, gave a high rating to the novel—4.16 out of 5 stars—as reviewed by 2,935 reviewers. Thus, the ratings show that the novel is worth reading.

(4)

Universitas Kristen Maranatha 2

The novel I choose to analyze, The Land of Stories: The Wishing Spell, is a story about Alex and Conner Bailey—a pair of twins who come to the Land of Stories where fairy tales are real. They have several adventures to collect the items to activate the wishing spell. The wishing spell is a legendary spell that can grant any one wish, but some items are needed for the spell to work. The twins have to collect the items by travelling to every kingdom in the world of The Land of Stories, for instance the Northern Kingdom, where Snow White lives and Sleeping Kingdom, where Sleeping Beauty sleeps for a long time. Their journey is not easy because they have to compete against the antagonist, the Evil Queen, who is also looking for the items for the spell.

I choose this novel because it has a lot of cliffhangers that make me curious about what will happen next. Even though the story Colfer wrote is taken from old-time fairy tales like Cinderella, Sleeping beauty, etc., he manages to present it in a new way—adding elements which are not present in the original stories and thus making it seems fresh. On top of that, Colfer’s characterization of the character is so vivid that readers are drawn into the story.

I analyze one of the major characters in this novel because I want to see how linguistic features can be used as a tool to analyze a character from a literary work. I believe this is something that can be developed to become a new field of research in linguistic field.

The character I analyze is the Evil Queen, the antagonist in the novel. In the story, the twins have to rally against her to collect the items as she needs them as well to free the person she loves. In the story, the Evil Queen succeeds in kidnapping the twins and stealing the items that the twins have collected for she

(5)

Universitas Kristen Maranatha 3

has followers whom she can take advantages from. The Evil Queen in Colfer’s book is different from the Evil Queen everyone knows; she is originally portrayed as a purely bad character who is lonely and does not have anyone close. Yet, in Colfer’s book, the Evil Queen has someone that she loves very much; moreover, the Evil Queen’s characteristics seem to change over the course of the novel.

When I read the novel, I think that Chris Colfer portrays the Evil Queen differently before and after she frees the man she loves. This piques my curiosity and therefore I am going to examine this difference by analyzing the degree of powerfulness of the Evil Queen using Functional Grammar.

This analysis belongs to the linguistic field of Stylistics. According to Simpson (2004), “Stylistics is a method of textual interpretation in which primacy of place is assigned to language” (p. 2). I use the theory of Functional Grammar to know how the character is portrayed by the novelist.

Halliday’s study (as cited in Gerot and Wignell, 1994) says that Functional Grammar is a study about meaning. There are three meanings in Functional Grammar; however, I will focus on the ideational meaning which consists of Transitivity analysis.

Transitivity is a central of processes (Gerot & Wignell, 1994), and processes are the tools I use in analyzing the character. Even though Halliday identified seven processes (Gerot & Wignell, 1994), Toolan (1998) states that a character’s degree of powerfulness can be seen through Material process, without looking the other six processes.

The analysis of the degree of powerfulness is significant as this will allow readers to be more critical in reading. The readers will not only read for

(6)

Universitas Kristen Maranatha 4

enjoyment but they can also understand the message that the novelist wants to convey; in addition, when the readers are able to analyze the characters, the readers will feel close to the characters because they understand the characters better.

(853 Words)

1.2 Statement of the Problem

I would like to analyze the following problems:

1. How is the Evil Queen described as a powerful character by the novelist? 2. How do the material processes reveal the degree of powerfulness?

1.3Purpose of the Study This analysis is done to:

1. find out the degree of the Evil Queen’s powerfulness which has been described by the novelist.

2. find out how Material processes reveal the degree of powerfulness.

1.4 Method of Research

First, I chose the data source to be analyzed. Then, I selected the data taken from the data source, after which I analyzed the data based on the theory of the degree of powerfulness in Functional Grammar. Finally, I wrote the research report.

(7)

Universitas Kristen Maranatha 5

1.5 Organization of the Thesis

The thesis consists of four chapters. It begins with Chapter One, which is the Introduction that consists of Background of the Study, Statement of the Problem, Purpose of the Study, Method of Research, and Organization of the Thesis. Chapter Two is Theoretical Framework, which explains the Linguistic area and the approach used in analyzing the data. In Chapter Three, there is the presentation of the data analysis. Last, in Chapter Four, Conclusion, I put forward my personal comments on the findings. Finally, the thesis ends with Bibliography and Appendices.

(8)

Universitas Kristen Maranatha 38

CHAPTER 4 CONCLUSION

In this chapter I would like to draw some concluding points based on the findings of the analysis in Chapter Three. The first finding is the fact that the writer arranges the story into two stages of the Evil Queen’s life. The first one is before she rescues her loved one, while the second one is after finding out that the person she loves is dead.

In the first stage, the Evil Queen is trying to rescue her lover. As seen in the table, there are 130 clauses describing this. However, when finding out that the man she loves is dead, Colfer only describes the Evil Queen in 32 clauses. Thus, it is obvious that the Evil Queen has a more dominant role during the first stage (80.2% of the total clauses) compared to during the second stage (only 19.8%).

In my opinion, the way Colfer portrays the Evil Queen in this way is to

emphasize the Evil Queen’s great love towards Mira, her boyfriend. In doing this, Colfer is leading the readers to see how the Evil Queen never gives up getting her

true love. I believe Colfer’s intention is to raise the readers’ sympathy towards the

(9)

Universitas Kristen Maranatha 39

Besides, by describing the Evil Queen in two stages of life, Colfer clearly portrays the change in the Evil Queen’s character. The Evil Queen, before saving the one she loves, is portrayed as an active and powerful character. On the other hand, after seeing that the one she loves is dead, she becomes less active

character. In my opinion, Colfer’s strategy is clever as he creates an antagonist that is dynamic and interesting. As we know, most antagonists in fairy tale stories are portrayed flat, and there is no change in character from the beginning of the story until the end. By creating a unique antagonist, the story becomes interesting to read.

The fact that it is nearly at the end of the story that the Evil Queen’s characteristics change is indeed a nice surprise. When first reading the story, the reader will think that the Evil Queen in this book is like an evil queen everyone knows. Yet, at the end, the surprise takes place and the reader is given a different

“Evil Queen”. This also supports the idea that Colfer intends to raise the reader’s

sympathy towards the Evil Queen.

The second finding is about the Evil Queen’s participant roles. Out of 130 clauses in the first stage her role as a doer is 75.4%, which includes the roles as an agent (72.3%) and medium initiator (3.1%). In the second stage, she is portrayed differently; she is a less active character. Only 40.6% out of 32 clauses describes the Evil Queen as a doer, while there is 59.4% of the clauses that shows her as a done-to individual. In my opinion, through this kind of portrayal of the Evil Queen, Colfer wants to emphasize how powerful or active the Evil Queen is in the first stage. The reader is given a very active character, having the role of an agent,

(10)

Universitas Kristen Maranatha 40

at the beginning by making the Evil Queen do all the activities in order that the reader may feel her activeness and powerfulness.

In the second stage, we see that Colfer makes the Evil Queen less active.

He tries to make the reader feel the difference in the Evil Queen’s characteristics.

This will cause the reader to feel sympathetic towards the Evil Queen for in the first stage she is portrayed as the most active character—as an agent, but in the second stage she becomes a less active character—as a medium target.

Moreover, Colfer purposely makes the Evil Queen very active at the beginning so that the readers will notice clearly the character change. Logically speaking, if Colfer did not show 75.4% of the Evil Queen as the doer in the first stage, the reader would hardly be aware that the Evil Queen becomes less active. Thus, by reducing the Evil Queen’s role as an agent in the second stage, the reader will notice easily that the Evil Queen’s characteristics change, which is a great strategy.

I do think that Colfer focuses on the twist. The reader at the beginning are given a common antagonist, but at the climax of the story—when she finally finds out that the one she loves is dead—the twist happens. The readers may think it is different from other novels as there is a surprising plot. I see Colfer also thinks that not all antagonists are the same. By making the twist, it is expected that the reader wants to read more.

The other finding I get is the systematic and chronological plot in the first stage of life. I get three main events in which the Evil Queen does activities. First, the Evil Queen escapes from the dungeons of Snow White. Second, the Evil

(11)

Universitas Kristen Maranatha 41

Queen plans something to break the curse. The last is the Evil Queen takes the items to activate the spell.

In my view point, Colfer makes a clear plot about the Evil Queen to make the reader understand easily for the book’s target reader is early teenagers. As we know that early teenagers do not really like a complex and complicated story. The readers will not feel confused of what the Evil Queen does in the story as what she does is a clear and step-by-step process. The plot does not have a chronological plot or reverse chronology.

The next finding is the fact that the antagonist has someone she deeply loves. As we know, many antagonists do not have someone they can really love. An evil queen in common fairy tales does not have anyone she truly loves. She just wants to make people suffer. On the other hand, in Colfer’s work, the antagonist has someone she really loves whom she will do anything to rescue. All the activeness or powerfulness of the Evil Queen can be said to refer to what she does in rescuing her lover. In my opinion, Colfer wants to tell that even an antagonist fights for the one she loves. Hence, the reader will realize that there is a

moral lesson of the Evil Queen’s life, which is never to give up for the loved one.

Finally, as a suggestion, those who are interested in doing a similar topic like mine had better choose to analyze a character that is portrayed uniquely so that there will be something interesting to analyze. In addition, they had better choose a novelist that has his or her own style so that the analysis is worth doing.

(12)

Universitas Kristen Maranatha 42

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Primary Source

Colfer, Chris. (2012). The land of stories: The wishing spell. New York: Little, Brown and Company.

References

Amazon. The Land of Stories: The Wishing Spell. Web. 10 October 2015.

Gerot, L & Wignell, P. (1994). Making sense of functional grammar. Sydney: Gerd Stabler Antipodean Educational Enterprises.

Goodreads. The Land of Stories: The Wishing Spell. Web. 10 October 2015. Nytimes.The Land of Stories: The Wishing Spell. Web. 10 October 2015.

Simpson, P. (2004). Stylistics: A resource book for students. London: Routledge. Toolan, M. (1998). Language in literature: An introduction to stylistics. London:

(1)