PSYCHOLOGICAL ANALYSIS ON R. L.STEVENSON’S TREASURE ISLAND
A Proposal of Seminar on Literature By: Anisa Ika Purnamasari
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION
A. Background of the Study
Literary work is one of cultures that express an imagination creation of people. There are many expressions of people like a self conscious, a soul conscious and a body conscious. The reality cannot described in a clearly way because it is very complex, so literary work become a media. Basically, literary work can describe the process of human life, so people can understand and study about it.
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B. Identification of the Problem
Based on the background of the study above, there are some problems that can be identified. They include the analysis about character and characterization itself and analysis about the psychological approach itself and the psychological analysis on R.L. Stevenson’s Treasure Island.
C. Limitation of the Problem
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A. Formulation of the Problem
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B. Objective of the Study
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C. Significance of the Study
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CHAPTER II
REVIEW OF RELATED THEORIES
A. Biography of the Author
Robert Louis Stevenson was born November 13, 1850 in Edinburgh, Scotland, the only son of respectable middle-class parents. Throughout his childhood, he suffered chronic health problems that confined him to bed. In his youth, his strongest influence was that of his nurse, Allison Cunningham, who often read Pilgrim's Progress and The Old Testament to him. In 1867, Stevenson entered Edinburgh University as a science student, where it was tacitly understood that he would follow his father's footsteps and become a civil engineer. However, Robert was at heart a romantic, and while ostensibly working towards a science degree, he spent much of his time studying French Literature, Scottish history, and the works of Darwin and Spencer. When he confided to his father that he did not want to become an engineer and instead wished to pursue writing, his father was quite upset. They settled on a compromise, where Robert would study for the Bar exam and if his literary ambitions failed, he would have a respectable profession to fall back on.
In order to fully comprehend the world in which Stevenson was raised, it is necessary to understand that there were two Edinburghs, both of which helped mold his personality and life outlook. On the one hand, there was the respectable, conventional, deeply religious, and polite New Town. On the other hand was a much more bohemian Edinburgh, with brothels, shady characters and underhanded dealings. The juxtaposition of these starkly different parts of town made a deep impression on Stevenson and strengthened his fascination with the duality of human nature, later providing the theme for The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.
In the fall of 1873, Stevenson fell ill, suffering from nervous exhaustion and a severe chest condition. His doctor ordered him to take an extended period of rest abroad. For the next six months, he convalesced in the South of France, and worked on essays. On his return to Edinburgh, he spent much of his time writing book reviews and articles and experimenting with short stories. Slowly but surely, he earned a name for himself in journalism and his pieces began appearing in distinguished journals such as The Fortnightly Review. While establishing his name as a writer, Stevenson met an American married woman, Fanny Vandergrift Osbourne, who was ten years his senior. Osbourne had traveled to Europe in an attempt to escape her estranged husband's influence. For three years, Stevenson, who was still in ill health, continued his relationship with her and eventually followed her to San Francisco, where she divorced her husband and married Stevenson in May 1880.
In 1878, Stevenson published An Inland Voyage, which recounts a canoeing holiday in Belgium. In August 1880, the Stevensons returned to England. He and his wife wintered in the South of France and lived in England from 1880-1887, a period of time was marked by great literary achievement. Stevenson's first novel, Treasure Island, was published in 1883, followed by The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1886) and Kidnapped (1886). Stevenson's work was highly popular and he received great critical acclaim.
Upon his father's death in 1887, Stevenson chose to leave England and sailed for America, where he stayed for a year. In May 1888, accompanied by his wife, stepson, and mother, he set sail for the South Seas. Stevenson grew so enchanted by the life of the South Seas that in December 1889 he bought an estate in Apia, Samoa, convinced that he could never again endure the harsh winters of his native Scotland or England. Apia was a perfect location because the climate was tropical but not wild, the people were friendly and hard working, and there was good postal service in the country.
Stevenson lived at his 300-acre estate, Vailima, in the hills of Apia until his death in 1894. While in Vailima, Stevenson wrote a great deal, completing two of his finest novellas, "The Beach of Falesa" and "The Ebb Tide", two novels, The Wrecker and Catriona, the short stories "The Bottle Imp," "The Isle of voices," and "The Waif Woman." He also published short works under the title Fables. Stevenson left a significant amount of work unfinished, including St. Ives, The Young Chevalier, Heathercat, and Weir of Hermiston, which he worked on enthusiastically until the day of his death. On December 3, 1894 he dictated another installment of the novel, seemed in excellent spirits, and was speaking with his wife in the evening when he felt a violent pain in his head and lost consciousness. Stevenson had suffered a brain hemorrhage and died a few hours later at the age of forty-four. (http://www.wikipedia/wiki/treasure_island_biography.org) A. Character and Characterization
a. Theory of Character
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1) The Protagonist
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2) The Antagonist
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3) The Companion or partner
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b. Characterization
Based on the characterization, characters in the novel can be divided into two groups, namely:
1) Flat Characters
A character in the novel is said to be flat when the he (she) has an unchanging characteristic from the beginning to the end of the story.
2) Round Characters
In contrast to the description of the flat character, a round character is one that undergoes changes in the characterization in the course of the story. A character, for the example, is describes to be morally good in the beginning of the story but after that he (she) becomes bad in the middle or in the end of the story. The reason is that the character undergoes changes in the characterization in the course of the story. In the same way, a character is said to be round when he (she) is bad in the beginning and then he (she) becomes good in the middle or in the end of the story. A round character can also be identified through the ambiguity of the characterization. The round character possesses two different characteristics or double personalities; in some cases the character is good but in other cases the character is bad.
B. Theory of Psychological
Psychology can be defined that the science of human spirit. As everybody knows that psychology itself is not only occur in the exact science, but also in literary. Psychology also explains about the behaviourism.
According to Carlson (2007: 3, 8) psychology is the science of behaviour, psychologists try to explain behaviour by discovering its causes, personality psychology is the study of individual differences in temperament and patterns of behaviour. It means that psychology can be generated by the individual factor which is affected by the pattern from the social factor, namely behaviour..
Psychology in knowledge, especially in the literary itself is not far to digress from the definition of psychology as term. Psychology (the science or study of mind and its process) can be used to help a literary critic, or a literary researcher to explain, interpret and evaluate literary works. The psychology o the author, the habits of the author in revising and rewriting his draft, the genesis of the work of art are examples of psychological studies towards a writer. Subhan (2010: 59)Psychology in literary as the helper in developing literary analyze and enrich method to find and explore the literary. There are parts of psychology literature. According to Subhan (2006: 84) “psychological of literature can be divided in four part namely: (1) the psychological study of the writer as type and as individual, (2) the study of the creative process, (3) the study of type psychological types and laws present within works of literature, and (4) the study effects of literature upon its reader (audience psychology). With psychology the reader of novel will easy to understand to the story especially about personality in the story of novel, because a person will understand personality if he/ she also understand learning theory, motivation, child development, perception and psychology.
CHAPTER III
RESEARCH METHOD
A. Type of the Study
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1. Main Data
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2. Supporting Data
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B. Data Collection Method
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C. Data Analyzing Method
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CHAPTER IV
DISCUSSION
A. The Characters
Character is the important element in the novel. Character in the novel can be divided into two groups that are: main/ major character and minor character. The character is focused on personality of man. The meaning of the character is divided in two groups; first, it is focused on personality of woman or the man who has a central in a story. Second, it is focused on psychology of man like moral value, emotional, desire, etc.
1. The Major Character in Treasure Island Novel
a. The Protagonist Character
Jim Hawkins - The first-person narrator of almost the entire novel. Jim is the son of an innkeeper near Bristol, England, and is probably in his early teens.
About the year 1760, Jim Hawkins lived with his father and mother at the Admiral Benbow Inn, somewhere in the south of England. (chp.I)
He is eager and enthusiastic to go to sea and hunt for treasure. He is a modest narrator, never boasting of the remarkable courage and heroism he consistently displays. Jim is often impulsive and impetuous, but he exhibits increasing sensitivity and wisdom.
b. The Antagonist Character
1) Long John Silver - The cook on the voyage to Treasure Island. Silver is the secret ringleader of the pirate band. His physical and emotional strength is impressive. Silver is deceitful and disloyal, greedy and visceral, and does not care about human relations. Yet he is always kind toward Jim and genuinely fond of the boy. Silver is a powerful mixture of charisma and self-destructiveness, individualism and recklessness.
2) Billy Bones - The old seaman who resides at Jim’s parents’ inn. Billy, who used to be a member of Silver’s crew, is surly and rude. He hires Jim to be on the lookout for a one-legged man, thus involving the young Jim in the pirate life. Billy’s sea chest and treasure map set the whole adventure in motion. His gruff refusal to pay his hotel bills symbolizes the pirates’ general opposition to law, order, and civilization. His illness and his fondness for rum symbolize the weak and self-destructive aspects of the pirate lifestyle.
3) Black Dog - A pirate and enemy of Billy. Black Dog pays an unexpected visit to Billy and threatens him. Billy attacks Black Dog, who flees but remains a herald of coming violence in the novel.
4) Pew - An old, blind beggar and pirate. Pew presents Billy with a black spot, an ultimatum to give up the sea chest’s contents to the pirate gang. Billy dies soon after Pew’s visit, and Pew then dies in a carriage accident. Pew can be seen as an angel of death, foreshadowing the many pirate deaths in the novel.
5) Israel Hands - The coxswain (a sailor who steers) on the ship. Hands is a former gunner on earlier pirate voyages. He is acting as one of two guards on the ship when the other pirates are ashore, but he gets drunk, kills the other guard, and lies in a drunken stupor while the ship drifts aimlessly. Hands symbolizes the reckless behavior of all the pirates.
6) Tom Redruth - One of Jim’s sailor companions on the ship. Tom is killed by pirate gunfire and buried with great ceremony on the island, an event that illustrates the good men’s respect for the dead
c. The Companion Character
1) Dr. Livesey - The local doctor. Dr. Livesey is wise and practical, and Jim respects but is not inspired by him. Livesey exhibits common sense and rational thought while on the island, and his idea to send Ben to spook the pirates reveals a deep understanding of human nature. He is fair-minded, magnanimously agreeing to treat the pirates with just as much care as his own wounded men.
1) Squire Trelawney - A local Bristol nobleman. Trelawney arranges the voyage to the island to find the treasure. He is associated with civic authority and social power, as well as with the comforts of civilized country life. Trelawney’s street smarts, however, are limited, as the ease with which the pirates trick him into hiring them as his crew demonstrates.
2) Captain Smollett - The captain of the voyage to Treasure Island. Captain Smollett is savvy and is rightly suspicious of the crew Trelawney has hired. Smollett is a real professional, taking his job seriously and displaying significant skill as a negotiator. Like Livesey, Smollett is too competent and reliable to be an inspirational figure for Jim’s teenage mind. Smollett believes in rules and does not like Jim’s disobedience; he even tells Jim that he never wishes to sail with him again.
3) Ben Gunn - A former pirate marooned on Treasure Island. Flint’s pirate crew left Ben Gunn on the island for three years. Ben’s solitude has left him somewhat deranged, and he has the appearance of a wild man. He represents a degradation of the human spirit, yet his experience has left him morally superior to the pirates. He is the only character to be reformed, as he shifts sides from the pirates to the good men, willingly helping Jim and Livesey. Ben’s uncanny imitations of the dead pirate Flint’s voice suggest that he is a kind of a ghost of a pirate.
2. The Characterization in The Treasure Island Novel
a. The Flat Character
Jim Hawkins, Dr. Livesey, Squire Trelawney, Captain Smollett, Pew, Israel Hands, Tom Redruth are the flat characters because there is not a change about the character behavior.
b. The Round Characters
1) Long John Silver - he being contrite because of the goodness of Jim and Dr. Levesey, namely allow him to put some gold of the treasure.
2) Ben Gunn – he had informed to Jim about him history and the trickiness of Long John Silver as the pirate.
3) Bill Bones – he had give the treasure map in his end life to Jim in order to avoid fall into Silver hands.
B. Story Analysis of the Novel
a. Synopsis
The story is told in the first person by Jim Hawkins, whose mother kept the Admiral Benbow Inn, and who shared in the adventures from start to finish. An old sea dog comes to this peaceful inn one day, apparently intending to finish his life there. He hires Jim to keep a watch out for other sailors, but despite all precautions, he is hunted out and served with the black spot that means death. Jim and his mother barely escape death when Blind Pew, Black Dog, and other pirates descend on the inn in search of the sea dog’s papers. Jim pull a packet of papers to square the sailor’s debt, when they were forced to retreat from the inn. The packet contains a map showing the location of the pirate Flint’s buried treasure, which Jim, Doctor Livesey, and Squire Trelawney determine to find. Fitting out a ship, they hire hands and set out on their adventure. Unfortunately, their crew includes one-legged Long John Silver, a pirate also in search of the treasure, and a number of his confederates. Jim, hidden in an apple barrel, overhears the plans of the crew to mutiny, and he warns his friends. The battle between the pirates and Jim’s party is an exciting and bloody one, taking place both on the island and aboard ship. Jim escapes from the ship, discovers the marooned sailor, Ben Gunn, who has already found and cached the treasure, and finally the victors get safely aboard the ship with the treasure.
CHAPTER V
CONCLUSION
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