Analysis of Social and Inner Conflicts in Jessie Redmon Fauset's 'Plum Bun: A Novel Without A Moral'.

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Maranatha Christian University

ABSTRACT

Dalam tugas akhir ini, saya akan menganalisis konflik yang dialami tokoh utama dalam sebuah novel karya Jessie Redmon Fauset yang berjudul Plum Bun: A Novel Without A Moral. Novel ini mengisahkan tentang seorang wanita bernama Angela Murray, keturunan campuran kulit hitam dan putih atau biasa disebut dengan mulatto, di Amerika Serikat.

Konflik-konflik awal terjadi ketika identitas Angela sebagai keturunan kulit hitam diketahui oleh orang kulit putih di sekitarnya, perlakuan mereka terhadap Angela berubah. Angela memutuskan untuk pergi ke New York dengan melakukan ‘passing’ agar dapat menemukan kebahagiaan dan dapat diterima sebagai keturunan kulit putih. Konflik sosial and konflik pribadi terjadi pula di New York, yang membuat dirinya sadar bahwa berpura-pura menjadi keturunan kulit putih tidak membawa kebahagiaan bagi dirinya. Angela mulai berusaha untuk dapat menerima identitas dirinya sebagai keturunan orang kulit hitam.

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APPENDICES

Synopsis of Plum Bun: A Novel Without A Moral

Plum Bun: A Novel Without A Moral is a story of a woman named Angela Murray, who lives in Philadelphia with her family. She is a mulatto and she has one sister named Virginia Murray. Angela is light-skinned just like her mother while Virginia has dark skin just like her father. Because of her light skin many people think that Angela is white. Angela does not feel comfortable being black because of her bad experience as a young schoolgirl when her bestfriend named Mary Hastings abandons her and her instructor rejects her after finding out that Angela is coloured. Later on, she decides to leave Philadephia and her own sister to move to New York to begin a new life by doing the act of passing.

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24 Biography of Jessie Redmon Fauset

Jessie Redmon Fauset was born in Camden County, New Jersey, on 27 April 1882. She was the youngest of the seven children of Redmon Fauset, an African Methodist Episcopal Minister and Annie Seamon Fauset. She attended Philadelphia High School for Girls and became the first African-American to graduate. She applied to Bryn Mawr College but denied because of her race. The college helped her by finding a scholarship for another university so she continued her education at Cornell University. In 1919 Fauset left teaching and became a literary editor of Crisis with W.E.B Du Bois until 1926. Fauset wrote many articles, stories, and poems and also promoted the works of writers such as Langston Hughes, Countee Cullen, Claude McKay and Jean Toomer. Fauset helped to discover, promote and give a chance to African-American writers to create “black voice” in American literature.

All Fauset’s novel featured African-American middle class who are forced to deal with self-hate as well as racial prejudice. Fauset wrote four novels : There Is Confusion (1924), Plum Bun (1929), The Chinaberry Tree (1931), and Comedy:

American Style (1933). In 1929 Fauset married an insurance broker and World War I veteran, Herbert Harris. Jessie Redmon Fauset died of a heart disease on 30 April 1961. Jessie Redmon Fauset was called by Langston Hughes a “mid-wife” of African-American literature.

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CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

Background of the Study

Harlem Renaissance, also known as the New Negro Renaissance, is one of

the literary movements that happened between the 1920s and the 1930s in the

United States of America. This movement occurred in Harlem, a large

neighborhood within the northern section of New York City in upper Manhattan.

The term “Harlem Renaissance” described the extraordinary flowering works in

African-American literature, arts, and culture (Brown 218). It was also known as a

period of race consciousness and solidarity among African-American artists,

writers, and musicians (Witalec 1).

One of the Harlem Renaissance writers is Jessie Redmon Fauset. She is

known as the “midwife” of Harlem Renaissance, because “her visionary efforts,

mentoring and outreach to emerging writers intensified the intellectual and

creative output of the period” (Brown 150). Her career “reflected her keen

evaluations of social tensions, racial ideals, and the creative challenges and

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Maranatha Christian University many works including travel essays, short stories, novels, poems, essays, and

reviews. Between 1924 and 1933, she also published four novels in which she

focused on light-skinned black women who struggled with the dilemma of passing

for white (Witalec 364). They are There Is Confusion (1924), Plum Bun (1929),

The Chinaberry Tree (1931), and Comedy: American Style (1933). These novels

are said to have “strong and social purpose which is to portray the educated black

middle class and thereby uncover American racial prejudice (375).

I choose to analyze Plum Bun : A Novel Without A Moral in my thesis.

The novel is regarded by many scholars as Fauset’s best and most polished work

among all Fauset’s four novels (Brown 154). Plum Bun also received mostly

positive reviews upon its appearance. It is a story of a light-skinned woman

named Angela Murray, who lives in Philadelphia around the 1920s and does the

action of “passing” in order to pursue her education in art. At that time, racial

segregation in law and everyday practices limited African-American to gain

access to many public places and organizations in Philadelphia (“Leisure Time”).

In order to escape the racial segregation in her hometown, Angela decides to

move to New York and tries to pass for white. Angela hopes that she will make

her future brighter. In the end, the conflicts that Angela encounters, within herself

and with her society at that time, make her realize that she has to be proud of her

own identity as a black woman.

As conflicts is the most outstanding element in the novel, I will analyze

the social and inner conflicts that happen to the protagonist in the novel. Conflict

is “a situation in which there are opposing ideas, opinions, feelings or wishes”

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Maranatha Christian University and internal or psychological conflict (Shaw 91). In my thesis, I would like to

focus only on social and inner conflicts. Social conflict means a struggle between

man and man or man versus the society (91), whereas internal or psychological

(inner) conflict means a struggle between desires within a person (91).

Statement of the Problem

In this thesis, I will analyze:

1. What social and inner conflicts are experienced by the protagonist of the novel?

2. What are the causes of the social and inner conflicts?

3. What are the resolutions of the social and inner conflicts?

Purpose of the Study

Based in the problems stated above, the purposes of the study are :

1. To analyze social and inner conflicts happen to the protagonist of the novel.

2. To analyze the causes of social and inner conflicts.

3. To analyze the resolutions of the social and inner conflicts.

Method of Research

In writing my thesis, I use the library research. I first read the primary text,

Jessie Redmon Fauset's Plum Bun: A Novel Without A Moral. Then, I read the

reference books like encyclopedia and get some of the data from the Internet.

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Organization of the Thesis

This thesis will consist of three chapters, preceded by the Table of

Contents and the Abstract. Chapter One is the Introduction, which consists the

Background of the Study, the Statement of the Problem, the Purpose of the Study,

the Method of Research, and the Organization of the Thesis. The next chapter,

Chapter Two, is the analysis of social and inner conflicts in Jessie Redmon

Fauset’s Plum Bun:A Novel Without A Moral. Chapter Three, is the Conclusion,

followed by the Bibliography and the Appendices, which contain the Synopsis of

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CHAPTER THREE

CONCLUSION

After analyzing the social and inner conflicts of the protagonist, Angela

Murray, in Jessie Redmon Fauset’s Plum Bun: A Novel Without A Moral, I will

draw some conclusions of what has been discussed.

The novel tells the story of a mulatto named Angela Murray. Being a

light-skinned black brings about problems in her relationship with the white people

who at first think of her as white. Social conflicts are invitable to happen in her

hometown, Philadelphia.

Angela encounters three social conflicts in Philadelphia. The first social

conflict between Angela and her highschool bestfriend, Mary Hastings. On

learning the truth about Angela’s background from another classmate, Mary is

surprised and starts questioning why Angela does not tell her background to

Mary. The relationship becomes not as good as before. Angela thinks that by

telling or not telling her background should not affect their friendship.

Angela also has a conflict with Mr.Shields, her instructor in academy. The

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the second social conflicts cause Angela to think that being a black descendant has

caused her to live an unhappy life. Thus, she decides to go to New York to do the

act of passing.

The third social conflict between Angela and Virginia, her sister, is about

the disagreement about the matter of colour that later confirms Angela’s decision

to go to New York. Having light skin, Angela wants to do the act of passing so

that she will be considered white. However, Virginia thinks that Angela should

accept her background as black. The conflict is solved as Virginia finally

understands Angela’s opinion and lets her go to New York. All the conflicts in

Philadelphia show that Angela is unaccepted as black which later makes her go to

New York in order to hide her identity. Angela decides to do the act of passing

with a hope that she might be accepted as white in order to gain happiness.

Having done the act of passing, which means she is considered white,

Angela still has to face problems. In New York, Angela encounters two social

conflicts and three inner conflicts. Angela unintentionally neglects Virginia to

avoid Roger finding the truth abouth her background, which causes Virginia to

feel hurt because she thinks Angela does not want to acknowledge her anymore.

Angela hopes that Virginia can understand her reason for doing so. The conflict is

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Angela also has an inner conflict that relates to her relationship with Roger

Fielding. After a 10-month relationship with Roger, Angela starts questioning it as

she finds out that Roger does not pay her as much attention as before. Although

she needs the relationship to later secure her financial matter, she thinks Roger’s

treatment towards her is intolerable. The conflict is solved unexpectedly as Roger

breaks up their relationship because for him his relationship with Angela is not a

special one. The conflict with Roger shows that even though Angela succeeds in

passing for white, she still does not get her happiness.

The next social conflict happens between Angela and Anthony Cross,

Angela’s classmate who loves her. Her passing has caused Anthony to think that

she is white. At the same time, Angela also thinks that Anthony is white so it is

suitable for her to be together with Anthony. Anthony, however, insists that it is

impossible for them to be together because he is coloured and Angela might not

want to accept him; moreover, he does not want to see Angela anymore. The

conflict is solved when both explains the truth about their background a a mulatto

that they do not have a problem related to skin colour anymore.

The last inner conflict happens when Angela encounters four reporters that

want to humiliate Angela’s black friend, Rachel Powell. She wants to help her

friend by revealing her own background but in doing so she will not get her prize.

The confict is solved as Angela decides to reveal her background to help Miss

Powell. The resolution of this conflict shows that Angela has finally accepted

herself being black. She also gains happiness from Anthony, her lover, Virginia,

her own sister, and also some of her friends who still want to accept Angela in

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All the conflicts that Angela has encountered in New York have made her

realize that pretending to be white by doing the act of passing does not guarantee

her happiness. She comes to the realization that she should accept herself for what

she is. The conflicts are used by the author of Plum Bun: A Novel Without A

Moral, Jessie Redmon Fauset to convey the idea that the act of passing done by

black women will not change the fact that they are black nor give them a

guarantee of happiness. Thus, the most important thing for black women to gain

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BIBLIOGRAPHY

Primary Text :

Fauset, Jessie Redmon. Plum Bun: A Novel Without A Moral. New York:

Frederick A. Stokes Company, 1928. Print.

References:

Brown, Lois. Encyclopedia of the Harlem Literary Renaissance. New York: Facts

on File, Inc., 2006. Print.

“Conflict.” Def. 3. Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary.8th ed. 2010. Print.

Dickinson, Laurie. “Jessie Redmon Fauset”. Jessie Redmon Fauset: Voice From

The Gaps. University of Minnesota. 7 Jan. 1996. Web. 10 Apr. 2012.

“Leisure Time.” The African American Experience in Philadelphia. Philadelphia

History Museum. Web. 11 Nov. 2013.

Lewis, John Johnson. “Jessie Redmon Fauset”. About.com: Women’s History.

Web. 11 Nov. 2013

Shaw, Harry. Dictionary of Literary Terms. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1976. Print.

Witalec, Janet. The Harlem Renaissance: A Gale Critical Companion. Vol. 1.

Detroit: Gale, 2003. Print.

- - - . The Harlem Renaissance: A Gale Critical Companion. Vol. 2. Detroit: Gale,