1 Chapter I Introduction 1.1. Background of Choosing the Subject This undergraduate thesis analyzes the novel entitled The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe by C.S Lewis (Lewis, 1950). Lewis was born on November 29, 1898 in Belfast Ireland. He went on to teach at Oxford University and became a renowned apologist writer, using logic and philosophy to support the tenets of his Christian faith. He is also known throughout the world as the author of The Chronicles of Narnia fantasy series, which have been adapted into various films for the big and small screens ( Lewis Profile ). Lewis had an idea to write children books for the first time in 1939. During that time, many children were evacuated from England's major cities and sent to live in the countryside to avoid German air raids in World War II. Lewis had opened his home, The Kilns, to hold some of these young refugees. One of them had been fascinated by a wardrobe there. Then Lewis remembered about the story that he had first read about a magic wardrobe when he was a boy back then. The title is The Aunt and Anabel by Edith Nesbit (Imbornoni, The Origins ). There are seven novels from Lewis works; the first book is The Magician s Nephew (1955), the second book is The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (1950), the third book is The Horse and His Boy (1954), the fourth book is Prince Caspian (1951), the fifth book is The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (1952), the
2 sixth book is The Silver Chair (1953) and the seventh is The Last Battle (1956). The writer has chosen The Chronicles of Narnia to be observed because she wants to learn about Narnia world deeply by knowing its second edition. According to the Narnia series, the plot of Narnia series chronologically began from the Magician s Nephew even though Lewis created The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe earlier. The writer uses the second edition of Lewis novel because there is a character that appeals her interest to analyze it, and this Narnia s character is named Edmund Pevensie. In addition, the writer learns about Edmund s characters in the Chronicles of Narnia because she considers the words in the novel are easy to understand since the novel is meant for children. In the novel, Narnia is a fantasy world which is located inside the real world because the gate to Narnia world is an old wardrobe. It is located in the big house owned by an old Professor. The novel itself gives information about Narnia world, for instance, in Narnia animals can talk, and there is also a figure of a god in Narnia named Aslan which appeared as a great golden lion. There are also mythical creatures which are found in the novel and do not exist in our world such as The White Witch, Dryads, Faun, Mermaid, Nyads, Dwarf, and Centaur. 1.2. Objective of the research The objective of this undergraduate thesis is to identify the factors that influenced Edmund s personality traits throughout the story.
3 1.3. Focus of Examination In line with the objective of this paper, the focus of examination is on the character, Edmund, throughout the plot and the factors that cause his development. To gain the answer to the factors, the writer needs to get information about the plot structure in the novel and Edmund s relationship with the other characters. 1.4. Scope of Study The writer studies the character development of Edmund from The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe. Edmund s behaviors include his personality found in the novel, his relationship with other characters, and the development of his character as well as the causes of his development while the plot progresses by looking into the factors which cause his character to develop. 1.5. Theoretical Approach Abram s objective approach from his book The Mirror and the Lamp is applied in the analysis. Abram states that, There is also fourth procedure, the objective orientation, which on principle regards the work of art in isolation from all these external points of reference, analyze it as a self-sufficient entity constituted by its part in their internal relations and sets out to judge it by criteria intrinsic to its own mode of being (26).
4 The theory will focus on the elements that are known as intrinsic elements which refer to the inside of literary work. The instrinsic elements include the plot, character, setting, theme, point of view, language, and etcetera. Meanwhile, the external elements refer to the outside of literary work that includes biography of the author, sociological aspect, and etcetera. This undergraduate thesis analyzes the characters of Edmund Pevensie s throughout the plot in the novel. To support the analysis of this undergraduate thesis, it is important to know and have deep understanding on the concept of character, characterization, plot, and character development. The characters of Edmund will be revealed after understanding the relation between character and plot which later will develop or not develop his characters. 1.6. Methods of Research 1.6.1. Method of collecting data The method used in this study is a library research. The data are collected from books in the library. The data are divided into two categories: primary data and secondary data. The primary data of the research is Lewis Novel the Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe. The secondary data are taken from books written by the experts which are relevant to the analysis. The books that writer used such as The Mirror and the Lamp by Abrams M.H, Writting Essays about literature by Griffith Kelley, Aspects of the Novel by E.M Forster, and et cetera.
5 1.6.2. Method of Analyzing Data The method of analyzing data for this undergraduate thesis is descriptive analysis as suggested by Griffith, which is explained in his book Writing Essays about literature as descriptive term, fiction is misleading, for although fiction does often include made-up or imaginary elements, it has potential for being true : true to the nature of reality and true to the human experience (41). This is based on the writer s reason that she needs to describe the novel thoroughly, by which it will sharpen the researcher s analysis on Edmund s behavior as depicted in Lewis The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe. In this case the writer uses experts theories to support her analysis, and then searches other relevant undergraduate thesis as references without any purpose of copying, adopting or quoting any statements from them to keep her originality in writing a particularly different thesis. The writer decides to focus on one objective in terms of the factors that influence Edmund s behavior in the story. The first step is that the writer describes the events which reveal the behaviors of Edmund s in the story. In order to reveal the factors that cause Edmund s development, the writer needs to select the important events occurring in the plot, and then seeks Edmund s position in the plot for the purpose of finding out his role or actions that will be required as information for the factors. After identifying the characters and analyzing Edmund s character development, the writer takes the second step by analyzing the factors. Those factors are concluded from the conflicts of Edmund which appeared in the plot.
6 In the end, the writer will find out if those conflicts which become the reasons of whether Edmund s characters develop or not. 1.7. Literature Review There are four researchers who used Lewis book as their research. All of their works now belong to Faculty of Cultural Sciences Library, Universitas Gadjah Mada. Another research is found in the web source. Yhonas Oktavian s undergraduate thesis is entitled Characterization of Edmund Pevensie s in C.S. Lewis The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe: The Novel and the Film. He analyzed Edmund s character and characterization in both the novel and film through the plots to find Edmund Pevensie s characterization (3). He identified both plots from the film and the novel as important elements of the story even though Yhonas only focused on Edmund s behaviors in the film and adds it from the novel. Yhonas used Abrams theory of objective approach as well as Griffith s plot theory. He used Griffith s theory to find out Edmund s behaviors in the novel. Therefore, he could strengthen his analysis on Edmund s characterization, and in the end he found that Edmund s character was developed but he did not focus on it. Shasa Mercya Pramitha s undergraduate thesis is entitled The Folklore behind the Mythical Creature in The Chronicles of Narnia. She analyzed the entire mythical creatures that exist in the land of Narnia in the Chronicles of Narnia series, such as Fae, Satyr, and other mythical creatures, then explains and
7 connects it with the folklores that exist behind each of the mythical creatures (3-4). Linda Setyawati s undergraduate thesis is entitled The Reflection of Clive.S. Lewis Life in The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe. She analyzed the reflection of Lewis life through the two elements in his work which are the setting and two central characters in Lewis novel that is Aslan and The White Witch (3). Another research about this novel was done by Untung Prayitno on his undergraduate thesis entitled An Analysis of Edmund Pevensie Characteristics: The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe Movie. He analyzed Edmund s characterization in the movie. Like Yhonas undergraduate thesis, he also mentions that Edmund s character is developed; however, he focuses on Edmund s development only in the movie (5). Even though Yhonas and Untung s undergraduate thesis analyzed the same character, Edmund Pevensie, their papers have different objectives from the writter papers. Yhonas undergraduate thesis is to analyze Edmund Pevensie s characterization from both the novel and film; on the other hand, the objective of Untung s undergraduate thesis is Edmund s characteristics in the film, and as a result they find out that Edmund s characters developed in the end of the film and the novel. Even though the writer uses the same theory such as Yhonas to analysis Edmund s behaviors, her analysis is far different from Yhonas undergraduate thesis because Yhonas focus is the flow of the plot in the film and add several events from novel itself while the writer focuses only on Edmund s events connected to the main plot in the novel. Unlike the previous both
8 researchers, the writer wants to complete Edmund s character analysis from the previous researchers because the writer finds the point which is never mentioned and explained in their undergraduate thesis. 1.8. Presentation The overall structure of the paper consists of four chapters. Chapter One is the introduction which is part of the detailed framework of the study. It contains the writer s reason in determining the subject of study, the goal of the research, the method, the theories which are used to conduct the study, and the review of some literature works of Narnia which have already been done before. Chapter Two begins with the theoretical approach of the research. The researcher needs to add the other theories in her research such as the theory of character, characterization, plot, the relationship between the plot and character, and character development. In addition, she also cites the explanation of Edmund s characters background profile from the website. Chapter Three is the analysis of Edmund s behaviors throughout the plot, his position in the plot and his relationship with the other characters, and the factors that cause his development. Finally, Chapter Four is the conclusion of which consists of the findings the research question. The researcher explains Edmund s plot in the novel to find out his behaviors throughout the story and his position in the plot. She also explains his relationship with the other characters to find out the core of his conflicts in the story that lead to the answer of the objective and the factors of whether his characters developed steadily or did not develop during the story.