CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION 1.1. Background of Analysis This thesis is based on three short stories entitled The Oval Portrait, The Black Cat, and Berenice which are considered into literature. Literature is very complex to be defined. As cited in Merriam Webster s Encyclopedia of Literature: Literature: [Latin: litterature, writing, elements of elementary education, literature, a derivative of litteratus versed in literature, cultured]. 1) Archaic knowledge of book; literary culture. 2) The production of literary work especially as an occupation. 3) Writings in prose/verse, especially writing having excellence of form or expressions, and presenting ideas of permanent or universal interest. 4) The body of written works produced in a particular language, country, or age. 5) The body of writings on a particular subjects. 6) Printed matter (as leaflets, handbills, or circulars). [Kuiper (ed.), 1995:686] Nowadays, two most common modern forms of literary form are short story and novel, which have been in existence for little more than two centuries. Yet long before the invention of writing, for thousands of years ancient people developed complex oral traditions of literature, for example myths, legends, folk tales, beast fables, parables, etc. Short story genre had an important influence from the Italian novella of the late Middle Ages and Renaissance. One of the short story genre is fiction, which have the element of horror, science fiction and detective tales. Edgar Allan Poe s short stories,the Oval Portrait, The Black Cat, and Berenice, belong to horror or usually being called as Gothic short story. Edgar Allan Poe s writing is characterized by the sense of mystery, supernatural, brooding human consciousness of death, thrilling and etc. All these elements that support his writing belong to Gothic novel (read: short story) as cited in Merriam Webster s Encyclopedia of Literature:
Gothic novel is novel which its imaginative impulse was drawn from the rough and primitive grandocer of medieval buildings and ruins, such novels were expected to be dark and tempestuous and full of ghosts, madness, outrage, superstition and revenge. [Kuiper (ed.), 1995:613] From this statement, it is clear that in a gothic short story there is an imagination and description which is drawn by the dark and mysterious setting of an old building and the oddity of characters manner. Gothic stories are dominated by fear and terror and explores the themes of death and decay. The Gothic crosses boundaries into the realm of the unknown, arousing extremes of emotion with settings evoking a gloomy, morbid atmosphere while focusing in doom, destiny and fate. It deals with the dark, the sinister and the supernatural, oftern has symbolic characters such as the helpless female and associates common images and themes. These elements are intended to create in the reader a feeling that the veil of ordinary life has been torn back to reveal the darker aspects of life. According to Dictionary of Literary terms & Literary Theory, most Gothic novels are tales of mystery and horror, intended to chill the spine and curdle the blood. They contain a strong element of the supernatural and have all or most of the now familiar topography, sites, props, presences and happenings. The elements that are clearly characterised in these three short stories are mystery, horror and madness of the character. Mystery is a work of fiction which have a mysterious event or unsolve problem at the beginning so that the reader has an opportunity to solve the problem. Horror is a story in which the focus is on creating a feeling of fear for the reader. While the madness of the character is a change of the character s attitude from a normal person into an abnormal. I choose these short stories as the material to be analysed because I am interested in them and also impressed by the way Poe built the atmosphere of Gothic by using these elements. So by analysing Edgar Allan Poe s short stories I want to find out the characteristic of Gothic such as mystery, horror and madness of the character that found in the short stories.
1.2. Statement of Problem Reading a gothic story can make people feel the atmosphere of fear, mystery, thrilling and etc. As cited in An Introduction to Fiction: The term of Gothic is sometimes applied to stories that are without either castles or haunted houses, but are heavy with sinister, brooding atmosphere or portrays violence and insanity to stress horror. [X.J. Kennedy, 1976: 196] I am analysing these three short stories, I focus on how the characteristics of mystery, horror and madness of the character potrayed as gothic elements in Edgar Allan Poe s three short stories are. 1.3. Objective of Analysis In accordance with the title of the thesis, I will analyse the gothic elements of Edgar Allan Poe s three short stories entitled The Oval Portrait, The Black Cat, and Berenice and the main purpose is to find out the characteristics of mystery, horror and madness of the character as gothic elements in Edgar Allan Poe s three short stories. 1.4. Scope of Analysis I limit my analysis only to analyse three elements of gothic such as mystery, horror and madness of character. Mystery as gothic element will be analysed based on point of view of the narrator in the stories. Horror as gothic element will be analysed based on the setting of the stories. While madness of character will be analysed based on the characterization of the character himself. 1.5. Method of Analysis According to Rene Wellek (1956), there are two basic elements of a literary work are intrinsic and extrinsic. Intrinsic method deals with elements inside the story itself such as plot, setting, character, etc. Extrinsic method deals with elements outside the story but still closely related and support the story, for example the approaches through biography, psychology, society, etc.
In analysing the short stories, I am using intrinsic method, which I read the stories again and again to understand the stories. Then I continue with selecting data or taking some notes and quotations from statements of the short stories. After that, I analyse the data by interpretating. The interpretation is described in order to find out the truth offered by the data. I am also collecting data from books, journals, some information from the Internet,which relates to Edgar Allan Poe, and other written sources as the library research. 1.6. Significance of Analysis This thesis is made to gain more knowledge about the Gothic elements that can be found in Poe s three short stories. I also hope that this thesis will be useful for the readers who want to widen their knowledge and enrich their interpretation about Gothic elements shown in Poe s three short stories. 1.7. Review of Related Literature There are several books related to the title of the thesis that I use as reading materials and source of theories to support the analysis. The followings are the title and reviews of the books. From An Introduction to Fiction, by X. J. Kennedy (1976), I can find the way to analyse a short story. In getting a full achievement of short story s interpretation, I need to know and understand about its components. And from this book, I can find kinds of the components and the explanations clearly and easily understood. The components that I can find in a short story are plot, characterization, point of view, theme, setting, style and symbol. Setting is the time and place of a story and in most cases the details of description are given to the reader directly by the narrator. Point of view is character s attitude toward the situation. Usually it is a voice that provides information about the story. While characterization is a description of the character which helps us to understand the author s intent. So with these explanations, I realise that these components may help my analysis better.
I get the explanation of Gothic and its elements from Merriam Webster s Encyclopedia of Literature, by Kathleen Kuiper (ed.) (1995). This book really helps me a lot in finding and deciding what Gothic elements that I can use to analyse these three short stories. Gothic is a style of fiction characterized by the use of medieval settings, a murky athmosphere of horror and gloom, macabre, mysterious and violent incidents. To make a work belongs to Gothic genre, it must at least contain the elements of Gothic, such as mystery, horror and madness of the character. The mixture of these elements can make the reader feels fear, curious, amazed and so on. Without these elements, there won t be Gothic taste and lack of impression to the reader. From Dictionary of Literary terms & Literary Theory, by J.A.Cuddon (1996), I found the historical background of Gothic fiction and its development and the characteristics of it. So from this book I can understand more about Gothic fiction. Besides, I can also find the historical background of horror story as well. Overall, this is a very helpful book to get more information about Gothic, the elements of Gothic and other literary terms.