AN UNDERGRADUATE THESIS
Presented as Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements
for the Degree of
Sarjana Sastra
in English Letters
By
LIA HARININGTYAS
Student Number: 014214097
ENGLISH LETTERS STUDY PROGRAMME
DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH LETTERS
FACULTY OF LETTERS
SANATA DHARMA UNIVERSITY
i
AN UNDERGRADUATE THESIS
Presented as Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements
for the Degree of
Sarjana Sastra
in English Letters
By
LIA HARININGTYAS
Student Number: 014214097
ENGLISH LETTERS STUDY PROGRAMME
DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH LETTERS
FACULTY OF LETTERS
SANATA DHARMA UNIVERSITY
iv
you can start from now and have a brand
new end.
v
to
vi
Thee, the Almighty Jesus Christ, to whom I walk with, for His undemanding love, for always waiting for me whenever I run out from Him and get lost.
I would like to thank my beloved father, Hari Santoso, for supporting me in his unique ways and my loving mom, Chatarina Martanti for love, prayers and patient in every ‘evil’ thing I do. I thank my two big brothers, Andre Wahyu Widoyo and Febrian Hari Putro for big love, laugh and hug.
An enormous gratitude goes to my advisor, Dra. Theresia Enny Anggraini, M.A., for her patience, attention, corrections, and helpful suggestion, my co-advisor, Dewi Widyastuti, S. Pd., M. Hum, for giving suggestions and corrections and I greatly thank my examiner, Maria Ananta Tri S, S. S., M. Ed, for useful discussion.
A phase of life in Sanata Dharma has united me with lots of precious people with whom I improve my life. I thank Xantie, Fany ‘Jutex’, Imel, Petriza, Deny, Fonny, Im-Boed and Monda, for sharing love and tears. Once I ask Him friends, He gave me angels. I thank my ‘sisters’, mb Yeni, mb BJ, mb Njunk for never ending support, brothers and sisters inPSM Cantus Firmus,Sekawanchoir,
Kontjo Kenthel choir, Pasca Sarjana USD staff and the generation 2001 of English Letters Department for invaluable life experiences. All of you complete my drawing book.
ix
A. Background of the Study 1
B. Problem Formulation 4
C. Objectives of the Study 4
D. Definition of Terms 4
CHAPTER II: THEORETICAL REVIEW 6
A. Review of Related Studies 6 B. Review of Related Theories 9 1. Theory on Character and Characterization 9 2. Relation between Literature and Psychology 11 3. Theory of the ‘False self’ 12
C. Theoretical Framework 24
CHAPTER III: METHODOLOGY 25
A. Object of the Study 25
B. Approach of the Study 26
C. Method of the Study 27
CHAPTER IV: ANALYSIS 30
A. The Characterization of the Women Characters 30 1. The Characterization of Sula Peace 30 2. The Characterization of Nel Wright 39 B. The Description of the Women Characters as Representative
of ‘False self’ 48
1. The Description of Sula Peace as Representative of ‘False self’ 49 2. The Description of Nel Wright as Representative of ‘False self’ 58
CHAPTER V: CONCLUSION 67
BIBLIOGRAPHY 72
x University.
This undergraduate thesis studies the personality of women characters in the novel,Sula by Toni Morrison to reveal their characterization as representation of ‘false self’ person. This novel was published in 1973 by Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., New York but the novel edition used in this thesis is the hardcover edition published by Plume Book, New American Library in 1982. The story is centered on the friendship between two adult black women, Sula and Nel. Though they were raised in the different way by their mothers, they develop themselves as the representatives of ‘false self’.
To analyze the novel, the writer formulates two problems. The first is how the two women characters, Sula and Nel, are characterized. The second is how both characters are described as representative of ‘false self’.
The approach used in this thesis is psychological approach that took psychological theory of ‘false self’ that mainly develops to be a result of the quality of mothering the child receives. The mother’s function as a mirror to the child’s gestures and experiences permits the child to make emotional connections with other people. When she fails to understand the child’s gestures, then the child were subjected to the mother’s needs and he/she incorporates him/her feeling to the mother’s. Therefore, the mother-daughter relationship in the novel is revealed because it is the core of the theory and it influences their characteristics.
xi
Dalam tesis ini, penulis mempelajari kepribadian para tokoh wanita pada novel berjudul Sula karangan Toni Morrison untuk mengungkapkan penokohan mereka sebagai penggambaran ‘diri yang salah’. Novel ini dipublikasikan tahun 1973 oleh Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., New York namun yang digunakan dalam skripsi ini adalah edisi hardcover yang diterbitkan oleh Plume Book, New American Library tahun 1982. Novel ini bercerita mengenai persahabatan diantara dua wanita berkulit hitam, Sula dan Nel. Meskipun mereka dibesarkan oleh ibu mereka dengan cara yang bertolak belakang, perkembangan pribadi mereka merupakan penggambaran ‘diri yang salah’.
Untuk mendapatkan hasil dari analisis ini, penulis merumuskan dua permasalahan. Pertama adalah bagaimana penokohan kedua tokoh wanita, Sula dan Nel, dan yang kedua adalah bagaimana penokohan kedua tokoh tersebut menggambarkan ‘diri yang salah’.
Tesis ini menggunakan pendekatan psikologi yang mengambil teori psikologi ‘diri yang salah’ yang merupakan hasil pola pengasuhan yang diterima anak dari ibunya. Fungsi ibu sebagai cerminan sikap tubuh dan tingkah laku anak memudahkan anak untuk menjalin hubungan emosional dengan orang lain. Ketika ibu tidak mampu memahami sikap tubuh anak, maka si anak dipaksa untuk memahami dan menyesuaikan keinginannya dengan keinginan ibu. Karenanya, hubungan ibu dan anak dalam novel ini menjadi inti pembahasan karena ini juga mempengaruhi penokohan para tokoh wanita tersebut.
1
A. Background of the Study
Society is the place where someone lives, interacts, responds, and communicates with others to fulfill his or her needs. In a society, people can produce sets of culture, norms, and regulations to be society’s competence to regulate any person by giving sanctions in order to maintain the existence of the society (Zahn, 1964: 5-9). A person has to deal with the norms to make him or her easier in getting his or her needs. Someone’s ability to adapt with the norms of society is indirectly influenced by his or her personality development. Personality development of person determines by the individual’s heredity endowment, early experiences within the family, and important events in later life outside the home environment. It can be understood that not just the development of conscience, his or her sense of right and wrong, but also his or her identification with his or her parents’ moral judgments and moral standard espoused by the peers will influence his or her moral view that help him or her in suiting themselves to the norms.
with the exercise of his or her ego functions (Elliot, 2002: 31). The child is allowed to feel free to express his or her desire and knows how to differentiate good from bad actions, whether that is right or wrong and whether that is acceptable or not.
If the mother fails to provide the liberating and supportive situation, the failure can lead the child to a ‘false self’. Winnicott defines the ‘false self’ in Anthony Elliot’s Psychoanalytic Theory: an Introduction the same as a person unable to establish stable emotional relations with others (Elliot, 2002: 32). A ‘false self’ person can either be ignorant to others or internalize the attitudes and reaction of others by abandoning his or her own desire.
The writer is interested to explore the topic of this thesis because the answer of the topic will help the readers understand how someone can be said as the ‘false self’. This topic is also interesting to analyze because readers can learn that family and environment around them are contributed much to their process in suiting themselves in society. Studying this topic may add readers’ knowledge as they may get something from the literary works. Edgar V. Roberts and Henry E. Jacobs in their book,Fiction: An Introduction to Reading and Writingsay that,
Literature helps us grow, both personally and intellectually; it provides an objective based on our knowledge and understanding; it helps connect ourselves to the broader cultural, philosophic, and religious world of which we are a part; it enables us to recognize human dreams and struggles in different places and times that we would never otherwise know (1989: 2).
Regardless of the representative of ‘false self’ could be either male or female, the topic might enriched the discussion on women-centered psychology. The analysis drawn in this thesis might show one of the psychological conditions experienced by (black) women at World War II as the impacts of economic deprivation. Diane Gillespie and Missy Dehn Kubitschek said in their essay that Toni Morrison’s Sula, a contemporary novel about female friendship, “offers a view of female psychological development that defies traditional male-centered interpretations of female development and calls out for an expansion of the women-centered paradigm” (Iyasere, 2000: 20).
the different personality of the characters leads them as representative of ‘false self’.
B. Problem Formulation
In order to analyze the story, the writer limits the discussion into two problems formulated as follows:
1. How are the two women characters, Sula and Nel, characterized in the story? 2. How are both characters described as representative of ‘false self’?
C. Objectives of the Study
The aims of this thesis are first, to know the personality of the two women characters, Sula and Nel, through each characterization. Second, is to identify both women characters as representation of ‘false self’ based on the characterization drawn previously.
D. Definition of Terms
There are several words appear as keywords related to the analysis. To avoid ambiguity, the words need to be defined as follow:
1. Personalitythat according to The Penguin Dictionary of Psychology means a simple description of an individual’s characteristic modes of behaving, perceiving, and thinking (Reber, 1995: 556).
like, and what others would like the individual to be; because the self is created through, and has implications for; an individual’s interactions with others (Magill, 1996: 1480).
3. ‘False self’, based on the explanation in Psychoanalytic Theory, means a self that compulsively anticipates the reactions of others. This self is at once a defense against the failure of maternal object as well as an attempt by the infant to establish some form of object relationship, however frail and brittle (Elliot, 2002: 74).
6
A. Review of Related Studies
Toni Morrison, the author who is being discussed in this study, is an American author and an educator who becomes one of the greatest and most influential figures in African American literature. Winning Nobel Prize in Literature, Morrison then is recognized internationally as an outstanding, fine writer. Each of Morrison’s novels is as original as everything that has appeared in black literature in the last twenty years. Like what Charles Larson stated
The contemporaneity that unites them (the troubling persistence of racism in America) is filled with an urgency that only a black writer can have about our society (www.cs.berkeley.edu/~lakhia/morrison/biograph.html).
When there was an explosion of talented black writers to the attention of the American reading public in 1960s, Toni Morrison perceived a void in the canon where a black female voice should be. A chronological reading of Morrison’s work, like Birch explained in Black American Women’s Writing, will show that her own voice gathers strength in later work as she considers the issue of female friendship, different aspects of love, and the help provided by community like in
The Bluest Eye(1970) andSula(1973), in which she focuses on the Black female (Birch, 1994: 150).
Merriam-Webster’s Encyclopedia of Literature mentioned that Sula
examines (among other issues) the dynamics of friendship and the expectations for the conformity within Black community (1995: 781). InSula, Morrison points to what can be lost when community disappears. Technological progress had brought isolation; a distancing of individuals from the emotional nutrition which had characterized the Bottoms, the community in the novel. Morrison suggests that in striving to survive ‘whole’ within community in twentieth-century America, Black American should nourish and in turn are nourished by, their own community. With this, they can preserve the sense of identity, which Nel and Sula in their own ways, had set about finding (Birch, 1994: 163-164).
The dragged Pecola Breedlove inThe Bluest Eyeis doomed to live forever in a state of perverted childhood, whilst Sula and Nel live into adulthood ultimately only given coherence by the death of Sula and Nel’s belated recognition of an abiding friendship.’ (1994: 150-151).
This thesis, which tries to show the different personality of the characters as a representation of ‘false self’, is a study that could enriches the discussion on
Sula especially in women-centered psychology since the characters analyzed in the thesis are women. Dianne Gillespie and Missy Dehn Kubitschek state in their essayWho Cares? Women-centered Psychology in Sulathat,
Minority literature offers women-centered psychology another expansion of the female self beyond the Euro-American mother-daughter or friend-friend dyad; Afro-American literature often explores a self-in-community (Iyasere, 2000: 20).
B. Review of Related Theories
The related theories reviewed in this chapter will be used in order to answer the problems. The related theories are the theory on character and characterization, relation between literature and psychology, also the theory of ‘false self’.
1. Theory on Character and Characterization
This undergraduate thesis will analyze both characters as representative of ‘false self’ based on their personality. Before analyzing their personality, the writer needs to know their characteristics using the theories on characters and characterization.
Character is an imagined person who inhabits a story. In A Glossary of Literary Terms, Abrams defines character as
person presented in a dramatic or narrative work, who are interpreted by the readers as being endowed with moral, dispositional, and emotional qualities that are expressed in what they say-the dialogue and by what they do-the action (1981: 23).
In the story, its characters act in a reasonably consistent manner and the author has provided them with motivation; the basic in the characters’ temperament, desires, and moral value for their speech and actions; or sufficient reason to behave as they do (Kennedy, 1999: 45).
and English Novel for Overseas Students(1972: 161-173) illustrates some ways in representing the characters or what Rohrberger and Woods said as characterization, the process to create characters (1971: 20). The author attempts to make his characters understandable and to come alive for the readers.
a. Personal description refers to physical appearance of the characters. The description is often related to his psychological condition. The personality itself can be reflected from the external appearance.
b. Character as seen by another means the author can directly describe the character through the opinion of another. Other characters will give explanation about what the character is like. Other’s thought about a certain character can be significant factors to build an understanding of him.
c. Through speech, the author can give us insight into the thought what the character says. Whenever the person is speaking, he is giving the readers some clue to his character.
d. Past life of characters is always closely connected to his present life. By learning about a person’s life past, the author can give the reader a clue that has helped to shape a person’s character. It was given through direct comment by the author, through the person’s thought or through other person.
e. Conversation with others and the things they say about him are the author’s clues to a person’s character. We need to pay attention towards the conversations of other characters. It is useful to go to speech-by-speech to determine exactly what it is meant or implied by each of them.
g. Direct comment is a straightforward description of the characters given by the author.
h. There are several parts in a story when the author describes clearly what the characters have in their mind. The readers trace in the characters’ mind to know their thoughts of something.
i. Mannerisms or habits done by the characters may tell the readers something about the characters.
2. Relation between Literature and Psychology
Analyzing literary works relating to psychology means an application of the rule of psychology within works of literature, as Rene Wellek and Austin Warren explain in their book,Theory of Literature:
By ‘psychology of literature’, or the study of the creative process, or the study of the psychological types and laws present within works of literature, or, finally, the effects of literature upon its readers (audience psychology) (1956: 81).
Critics might interpret literary work without any reference to its author’s biography, though it is allowed. David Daiches explains further in his book
In this thesis, the writer observes the behavior of the two woman characters and relates it to a psychological theory to know the psychological types of personality of the characters presented within works of literature.
3. Theory of the ‘False Self’
The psychological theory used as a mean of explicating and interpreting the work of literature applied in this thesis is a theory of the ‘false self’, a theory of self conceptualized by D. W. Winnicott. D. W. Winnicott is an influential figure in British school of object relations theory who defines the concept of the ‘false self’. The object relations theory itself is an offshoot of psychoanalytic theory that emphasizes interpersonal relations, primarily in the family (whoever the first caretaker of the child) and especially between mother (mostly) and child. Victor Daniels mentions that inner images of the self and other and how they manifest themselves in interpersonal situations with environment become an interest of object relations theorists (www.sonoma.edu/users/d/daniels/objectrelations). Anthony Elliot, inPsychoanalytic Theory: an Introduction, adds that
…object relations theory sees a fundamental link between self-formation and the environmental and emotional provisions provided by significant other persons (the dynamics of human interactions) (2002: 69).
newly born infant has to develop a sense of self from an original state of ‘unintegration’. This struggle of the self for an individuated existence characteristically centers on the quality of object relation between child and mother and ties to a state of what is called as ‘primary maternal occupation’. Winnicott conceptualizes that for a child to develop a healthy, genuine self, the mother must be a ‘good-enough mother’ and provides environmental provision called ‘good-enough mothering’ which is necessary for the development of a belief in benign environment.
influenced by the identification with the parents. The way they are rewarded or punished for behavior in specific situations will influence their moral views and relations with others (Atkinson, 1983: 81). Therefore, the appearance of a stable core of selfhood depends on establishing the kind of relationship and provision that are at once liberating and supportive, creative and dependent, defined and formless. The repetition of the satisfaction of instinctual needs, the child comes to see the world as benevolent that corresponds to the child’s own capacity to create, develop good object relations and remain healthy.
From this angle, Winnicott draws his distinction between the ‘true self’, a person capable of creating living, and the ‘false self’, a person unable to establish stable emotional relations with others. These selves develop as a result of the quality of the mothering the child receives (Elliot, 2002: 74). The good-enough mother, who understands and responds to the child spontaneous gestures, gives child’s weak ego the strength necessary to retain the expression of the ‘true self’. The child’s ego development has led to the creative and spontaneous expression of human needs and feelings. While on the other hands, the not good-enough mother, who cannot understand and react to such expressions, subjects the child to her own needs. The child tries desperately to make emotional relation with the mother by abandoning his or her own wishes and incorporating her demands, desires, and feeling.
or her true feeling behind a mask. Lacking a sense of trust from significant others close to him or her, human interaction for child is perceived as terrifying. The mother as the first and most significant other for the child plays an important task to give positive regards to the child so that the child can improve his or her self confident and express his or her feeling. When he or she is able to develop feeling of true positive regards for others, a harmonious relationship with others could maintain. Having a best friend relationship with somebody, a child might satisfy his or her needs because friendship pair functions to satisfy certain needs in each child, can act as vehicle of a child’s self-expression and to share values, attitudes, and expectations both for each other and for outsiders (Craig, 1979: 401).
On the contrary, when he or she is unable to adequately express inner needs and emotional longings, he or she turns defensively against himself or herself by internalizing the attitudes and reactions of others (Elliot, 2002: 32) and fails to maintain a healthy relationship with others. He or she will tend to repress his or her needs to meet with others’. It is the essence of the ‘false self’, for Winnicott, that it operates to hide the ‘true self’ which it does by compliance with environmental demands. It is through the ‘false self’ that the child builds up a false set of relationships.
In (http://sfhelp.org/01/f+t_selves.htm), Peter K. Gerald listed 42 typical behavioral traits of ‘false self’ wounds that helped the writer to analyze the characters. The traits are listed as below.
somewhere between, or a mix. S/He's mildly to very uneasy with ambivalence, vagueness, or uncertainty. (http://sfhelp.org/01/f+t_selves.htm).
2) S/He is often a (compulsive) perfectionist: achieving perfection is just "normal" (vs. special); S/He has trouble enjoying her/his own achievements, and is often uncomfortable accepting merited appreciation and praise. (http://sfhelp.org/01/f+t_selves.htm)
3) S/He is often rigid and inflexible. S/He thinks obsessively, and/or acts compulsively, even if personally unpleasant, unnecessary, or unhealthy;ors/he is overly passive and compliant, fearing to take personal, social, and occupational initiatives. (http://sfhelp.org/01/f+t_selves.htm)
4) S/He is usually serious, intellectual, and analytic, wanting to understand life and situations, and know in great detail whythings are as they are. S/He may be interested in psychology, counseling, and/or study and discuss human behavior "endlessly." (http://sfhelp.org/01/f+t_selves.htm)
5) S/He is often confused, disorganized, overwhelmed, and "helpless;" or is fiercely independent, controlling, andover competent. S/He depends excessively on, or chronically procrastinates or avoids seeking appropriate medical, psychological, social, and/or spiritual help (self neglect).
(http://sfhelp.org/01/f+t_selves.htm)
6) S/He is uncomfortable being silly, spontaneous, or child-like ("doesn't know how to play"), or is always silly, simplistic, and joking. S/He is uncomfortable
7) S/He is extremely responsible (over-willing to take charge, organize, and fix things, even if personally taxing); or frequently irresponsible and undependable;
and probably denies, minimizes, or rationalizes (explains) doing either one. (http://sfhelp.org/01/f+t_selves.htm)
8) S/He often has trouble feeling and/or expressing strong emotions, and/or tolerating them in others - especially anger, hurt, fear, and sadness. S/He often feels "nothing," or has frequent unpredictable or inappropriate outbursts of rage,
sadness, weeping, "depression," or anxiety. S/He may never apologize, or apologizes "all the time." (http://sfhelp.org/01/f+t_selves.htm)
9) S/He compulsively needs to control personal emotions, key relationships, and interpersonal situations. S/He is either overly aggressive, rigid, and domineering,
or subtly, persistently manipulative - e.g. using guilt-trips or a "helpless victim” stance, striving to "always" get her/his way. Where true, s/he probably denies, minimizes, jokes about, or rationalizes this. (http://sfhelp.org/01/f+t_selves.htm) 10) S/He has significant memory gaps about early childhood years and events, and one or both parents. S/He knows little about one or both parents' childhood experiences and feelings, and finds that unimportant or unremarkable. (http://sfhelp.org/01/f+t_selves.htm)
11) S/He's socially very shy or very adept, and has few or no real (intimate)
friends. S/He has a history of relationship avoidances and/or "failures," including divorce/s. S/He feels high discomfort with interpersonal commitment and/or
12) S/He may be sexually dysfunctional - e.g. impotent, frigid, or compulsively avoids sexual contact; or s/he is harmfully seductive and promiscuous, and/or
secretly uncomfortable with, or ashamed of, her or his gender, body (parts), sexual feelings and fantasies, and/or behavior. S/He may have been, or was, sexually molested or abused as a child or young adult. (http://sfhelp.org/01/f+t_selves.htm) 13) S/He "never gets sick," or suffers chronic illnesses like migraines or other headaches, back, neck, or other muscle pain; insomnia or apnea, obesity; asthma; gastric, intestinal, or colon problems; anxiety attacks; phobias; allergies, or other emotional or physical maladies which may not respond to appropriate medications or therapies. (http://sfhelp.org/01/f+t_selves.htm)
14) S/He is highly uncomfortable about revealing personal thoughts, feelings, and experiences (excessively distrustful or often discloses personal things
inappropriately (insensitive, over-trustful). (http://sfhelp.org/01/f+t_selves.htm) 15) S/He is uncomfortable giving, getting, and/or observing affectionate and appropriate touching and hugging ("stiff" or "cold"),and/or often touches others
dutifully, awkwardly or inappropriately. (http://sfhelp.org/01/f+t_selves.htm) 16) S/He often avoids personal conflicts with or between others, by changing or controlling the conversation, getting intensely angry, "collapsing," or withdrawing physically and/or emotionally ("numbing"); ors/he seems to often enjoy
triggering or experiencing conflict with or between others. (http://sfhelp.org/01/f+t_selves.htm)
17) S/He is compulsive about and/or is (or was) addicted one or more of these:
_ excitement / drama _ a special hobby _ pain / death
_ sugar / carbohydrates _ money / wealth / saving / spending / gambling
_ cleaning / neatness
_ food / dieting / nutrition _ another person _ work or "busy-ness"
_ sex / masturbation / porn _ fitness / health / exercising
_ God/worship/church / salvation / hell / Satan
_ lying/secrecy/truth/honesty _ "justice" / "fairness" _ image /others' opinions
_ a social "cause" _ caffeine / nicotine _ material possessions
_ emotional "recovery" _ _
18) S/He has children, relatives, and/or past or present partner/s who obsess about, or are or were addicted to, one or more of the above.
(http://sfhelp.org/01/f+t_selves.htm)
19) S/He has recurring depression apathy, and/or tiredness "for -no reason." S/He may have periodic sleep disorders (e.g. insomnia) and/or nightmares, and may use medication for these. (http://sfhelp.org/01/f+t_selves.htm)
20) S/He repeatedly feels empty "something's missing (in me)," or "I'mdifferent
(than other people) somehow...", without knowing why. (http://sfhelp.org/01/f+t_selves.htm)
21) S/He is fairly to very uncomfortable being alone,or prefers solitude to an
23) S/He often experiences "mind-racing" or "mind-churning": ceaseless "inner voices" (thought streams), which are frequently anxious, fearful, critical, argumentative, and/or chaotic. (http://sfhelp.org/01/f+t_selves.htm)
24) S/He is oftenhyper-vigilant: i.e. anxiously alert to the present and expected future actions of other people; Tends to "mind-read" and assume others' (usually negative) beliefs or intentions, and react to things that haven’t happened yet as though they had. (http://sfhelp.org/01/f+t_selves.htm)
25) S/He often smiles and/or chuckles automatically and inappropriately when nervous, hurt, confused, scared, angry, or worried (i.e. often); If so, s/he is usually unaware of this habit, can’t explain it, and may joke about it to hide anxiety. (http://sfhelp.org/01/f+t_selves.htm)
26) S/He often feels vaguely or clearly victimized by others or "fate"; Regularly
avoids taking responsibility for her/his own choices, and denies or endlessly rationalizes doing so;orassumes too muchresponsibility, and blames themselves
harshly (feels guilty) for things beyond their control. (http://sfhelp.org/01/f+t_selves.htm)
27) S/He is highly sensitive to real or imagined criticism from others; Unnecessarily rationalizes, explains, and defends their own actions and values; S/He is quick to blame others,oroften empathizes with "the other guy’s" situation
and gives in easily. (http://sfhelp.org/01/f+t_selves.htm)
28) S/He commonly fears, distrusts, is tense around, and/or argues with some
authority figures. S/He either feels very anxious without clear instructions, or
(http://sfhelp.org/01/f+t_selves.htm)
29) S/Hefears saying "no,"and setting appropriate limits with others; S/He feels reluctant to - and guilty about - asserting her/his own needs and ideas. (http://sfhelp.org/01/f+t_selves.htm)
30) S/Heconfuses pity with love, and/or associates love with pain. S/He usually focuses on others' needs first, and tends to rescue or "fix" them; or is
over-concerned with their own needs ("self centered"); S/He avoids intimacy, or cyclically seeks, then runs from it (has a history of cyclic "approach < > avoid" relationships). (http://sfhelp.org/01/f+t_selves.htm)
31) S/He hangs on desperately to "toxic" relationships - i.e. ones regularly yielding significant shame, fear, guilt, stress, and pain; "Over-loyal." S/He may repeatedly cycle between intense jealousy and guilt; Major personal relationship-choices are often largely based on fears of criticism, "being wrong," rejection, and abandonment. (http://sfhelp.org/01/f+t_selves.htm)
32) S/He feels bored, restless, or uneasy without current personal or environmental crisis chaos, or excitement; At times s/he seems to seek or make crises, and denies or rationalizes (justifies) this. (http://sfhelp.org/01/f+t_selves.htm)
33) Typically s/he either waits and reacts to situations,oris often self-harmfully
impulsive and proactive. (http://sfhelp.org/01/f+t_selves.htm)
35) S/He often seeks pleasure and gratification now, vs. later; S/He may defend
or minimize this, rationalize by saying "I can't help it," or deflect from it by joking. (http://sfhelp.org/01/f+t_selves.htm)
36) S/He prefers to work independently (e.g. as a consultant, craftsperson, or entrepreneur) and/or in a solitarysetting. S/He either changes jobs often, or stays at the same job for years. S/He works in a human-service occupation or avocation (nurse or doctor, teacher, counselor, lawyer, clergyperson, professional consultant …) (http://sfhelp.org/01/f+t_selves.htm)
37) S/He either rarely or frantically initiates social activities. S/He habitually avoidsorcompulsively seeks being the center of social or occupational attention. (http://sfhelp.org/01/f+t_selves.htm)
38) S/He is frequently either self-centered and grandiose, or subtly or clearly
self-abusive, self-deprecating, self-sabotaging, and/or self-neglectful (e.g. never seeing a doctor or dentist). (http://sfhelp.org/01/f+t_selves.htm)
39) S/He habitually withholds or shades the truth, or lies, to avoid expected criticism, rejection, or "hurting others". S/He denies doing so to Self and/or others, and secretly feels guilty and ashamed. (http://sfhelp.org/01/f+t_selves.htm) 40) S/He is secretly or openly critical or ashamed of their "looks," appearance, or body. S/He may be either extremely modest or very immodest; S/He consistently grooms and dresses either shabbily and drably, or "loudly," over-formally, or "perfectly"; (http://sfhelp.org/01/f+t_selves.htm)
42) S/He denies having many or most of these traits to excess, explains them defensively, and/or minimizes their personal significance - and s/he probably
denies this denial, or jokes about it. (http://sfhelp.org/01/f+t_selves.htm)
Later, the writer applies only 18 traits which are appropriate to the characters’ characterization that is already drawn before applying the ‘false self’ theory. The 18 traits are the trait number 1, 2, 3, 5, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 16, 21, 26, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, and 39. Those traits listed might be experienced different for each character and the numbers of the traits are differing for each character but both characters are also experience the same traits.
C. Theoretical Framework
The analysis takes some theories to answer the problems proposed in the problem formulation. There are theories on character and characterization, relation between literature and psychology, and the theory of ‘false self’.
Since the study is on the two women characters, Sula and Nel, therefore the analysis needs the theories on character and characterization in order to understand their characteristics before analyzing their difference of personality. This thesis learns characteristics of the characters by examining their dialogue, actions, and other characters’ opinion on the two women characters discussed. By analyzing the characterization of the main characters first, the writer can use this as the basic before analyzing the two woman characters’ difference in their personality.
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The object of the study to analyze in this thesis is a novel written by Toni Morrison, the only black woman who received the Nobel Prize of Literature up to now. The novel is entitledSulaand it was published in 1973 by Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., New York. The novel used in this thesis is the hardcover edition published by Plume Book, New American Library in 1982, and consists of 177 pages. The story is divided into two parts in which each part is divided again into several sub chapters. The sub chapters are initiated by a configuration of numbers that are showing the setting of the time of the story.
Sula is Morrison’s second novel. It becomes an alternate selection for the Book-of-the-Month club and an excerpt in a major American literary anthology,
The American Tradition in Literature also in the popular women’s magazine
Redbook (Iyasere, 2000: xvi). Sulais nominated for the National Book award for fiction and receives the Ohioana Book Award in 1975. (www.milikin.edu/aci/crow/chronology/ morrisonbio.html)
have their own families that are contrasted. Nel is the product of a family that believes deeply in social conventions while Sula is taught to be free in doing anything since her mother, Hannah, and her grandmother, Eva, never state a strict role in the house. Moreover, the town sees Eva and Hannah as eccentric and loose. Despite their differences, Sula and Nel become fiercely attached to each other during adolescence since both of them do not have a father. Nel’s father was absence after her birth while Sula’s died when she is only three years old.
Later, Nel chooses to marry and settles into the conventional role of wife and mother while Sula lives a life of fierce independence and total disregard for social conventions. Shortly after Nel’s wedding, Sula leaves Bottom (their community) for a period of 10 years but then she returned. Nel breaks off her friendship with Sula because Sula has an affair with Nel’s husband, Jude. Then the town regards Sula as the very personification of evil for her disregard of social conventions supported by her affairs with men. In the end of the story, just before Sula’s death, Sula and Nel achieve a half-hearted reconciliation. With Sula’s death, the harmony that had reigned in the town quickly dissolved.
B. Approach of the Study
“Psychology approach is the effort to locate and demonstrate certain recurrent patterns, but from different body of knowledge that is psychology” (1971:13).
This approach uses the psychological theories to explain human motivation, personality, and behavior patterns written in literary objects (1971:13-15).
The psychological approach perhaps least appreciated by many readers but it is challenging and rewarding since its proper application to interpret the literary work can enhance the researchers’ understanding and appreciation of literature (Guerin et al, 1999: 125). The approach lets the readers to analyze psychologically the characters or situations in the literary works.
The reason why the writer chooses the approach in analyzing the topic is because the writer studies the psychological aspects of the main character in the novel and its connection, either influencing or being influenced, by the family and society that lead them as the representative of ‘false self’ using psychological knowledge of ‘false self’ the writer has.
C. Method of the Study
In completing its analysis, the writer applied library or desk research. It means that the data, theories about literature, criticisms, and any other information that enriched the study were collected from the books.
The theories on character and characterization were taken from the books M.H. Abrams’ A Glossary of Literary Terms, C. Hugh Holman and William Harmon’s
A Handbook to Literature, M.J. Murphy’s Understanding Unseen: an Introduction to English Poetry and English Novel for Overseas Students. Since this thesis using psychological approach, the writer needs to know the relation between literature and psychology based on the explanations in Rene Wellek and Austin Warren’s Theory of Literature, and David Daiches’ Critical Approach to Literature. Theories of ‘false self’ are taken from Anthony Elliot’s book,
Psychoanalytic Theory: an Introduction, Introduction to Psychology by Rita L. Atkinson, Richard C. Atkinson and Ernest R. Hilgard and online resources connected with the theory.
The study took some steps to answer the problems on the problem formulation. The first step was to read and reread the novel as the primary data of the study until the writer got a full comprehension of it, by focusing the attention on the two main woman characters’ personality development that was influenced by the society. The conversations and descriptions given directly by the author led to the comprehension of their different personality.
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This chapter presents the analysis of the problems proposed in the previous chapter. There are two problems that need to be analyzed further. The first problem is about the characterization of the women characters who are Sula and Nel. The second problem is about the description of women characters’ personality as ‘false self’ based on the psychological theory used.
A. The Characterization of the Women Characters
Previously mentioned, the focus of the discussion is on Sula and Nel personality. Therefore, how Sula and Nel are presented in the story will be analyzed by applying the theory on characterization. The analysis will be divided into two parts, subtitled the characterization of Sula Peace and the characterization of Nel Wright.
1. The Characterization of Sula Peace
The first way of characterization is personal description in which the author describes the character’s physical appearance (Murphy, 1972: 161). In the novel, Sula Peace appears as a common black girl, a wishbone thin girl with a heavy brown skin color. She has wide large eyes which in one of her eyes, there is a birthmark shaped like a stemmed rose. People easily recognize her from the birthmark.
featured a birthmark that spread from the middle of the lid toward the eyebrow, shaped something like a stemmed rose. It gave her otherwise plain face a broken excitement and blue-blade threat like the keloid scar of the razored man who sometimes played checkers with her grandmother. The birthmark was to grow darker as the years passed, but now it was the same shade as her gold-flecked eyes, which, to the end, were as steady and clean as rain. (Morrison, 1982: 52)
autonomous and independent. The description of Sula’s house shows less supported circumstance for a child to grow up.
Similarly, Sula, also an only child, but wedged into a household of throbbing disorder constantly awry with things, people, voices and the slamming of doors…
…Sula’s wooly house, where a pot of something was always cooking on the stove; where the mother, Hannah, never scolded or gave directions; were all sorts of people drop in; where newspaper were stacked in the hallway, and any dirty dishes left for hours at a time in the sink, …(Morrison, 1982: 52 & 29).
When a child should be given an education about sex by the parents, Sula is smart enough to figure it out herself by seeing her mother relationships with men, mostly the husbands of her friend and neighbors. Her relationship with men indirectly
…taught Sula that sex was pleasant and frequent but otherwise unremarkable. Outside the house, where children giggled about underwear, the message was different. So she watched her mother’s face and the face of the men when they opened the pantry door and made up her own mind. (Morrison, 1982: 44)
of things are wrong or right. Hannah frees Sula to control of her own life, but she does not give feedbacks so that Sula hardly recognized which one is right or wrong, acceptable or not. Sula becomes unable to decide good from bad based on the norms and regulation that society has, on the other hand, she is able to make her own choices of life.
Lack of love, attention and directions, Sula has to understand everything happened in her life by her own because her mother would not lead or guide her. It makes her become an autonomous woman and it influences how she makes decisions of her life by her own and free to do things that are right according to her understanding though it might wrong but can be said as an awkward behavior done by a girl. Like an event when she slashes off the tip of her finger in front of white boys who like to harass black school children. She is bravely slashing her finger with a knife and calmly speaking to them that if she can do that to herself, she can do the same thing to them. Sula is so scared that the boys will harass them so that she slashes her finger just to intimidate them. It shows that Sula is very emotional when making a decision and behaving in severe situations which is not based on deep thinking of the risks and the impacts the decisions may cause, even that she has to hurt herself. The author describes or comments about it directly in the novel (Murphy, 1972: 170).
Sula, like always, was incapable of making any but the most trivial decisions. When it came to matters of grave importance, she behaved emotionally and irresponsibly and left it to others to straighten out. And when fear struck her, she did unbelievable things. (Morrison, 1982: 44)
She behaves emotionally and does unbelievable things to protect her because she learns that she cannot count on herself to others to help and protect her, not even her mother. Unintentionally, Sula hears Hannah’s statement about her. From quotation taken below, in the conversation between Hannah and her friends, Hannah mentions that loving and liking Sula is different thing.
Hannah smiled and said, “Shut your mouth. You love the ground he pee on.” “Sure I do. But he still a pain. Can’t help loving your own child. No matter what they do.”
“Well, Hester grown now and I can’t say love is exactly what I feel."
“Sure you do. You love her, like I love Sula. I just don’t like her. That’s the difference.”
“Guess so. Likin’ them is another thing.” “Sure. They different people, you know…”
She (Sula) only heard Hannah’s words, and the pronouncement sent her flying up the stairs. In bewilderment, she stood at the window fingering the curtain edge, aware of a sting in her eye. (Morrison, 1982: 57)
When a mother who should protect her child, Hannah does not provide enough safety Sula needed. From then on, Sula loses her trust to others and believes that it is only herself she could count on. She becomes selfish.
called rape. The birthmark she has now is taken into notice that it is a sign of her wicked behaviors by society. Her relationship with men is one way she frees her thoughts and emotions, an experimental life and she does not care about what society said.
Sula never thinks about how to gain good prestige in society, which she has to control her behavior in order to get appreciation or compliments from others, while most people try to gain their pride. She pleases others when others please her as if she has no obligation to it. Having a good name in society is not the important thing for her. She lives out her life to explore her thoughts and emotions.
an exploration life. Therefore, she is completely has no ambition to marry, having a husband and children, posses wealth and compliments from others.
She was completely free of ambition, with no affection for money, property or things, no greed, no desire to command attention or compliments-no ego. For that reason she felt no compulsion to verify herself-be consistent with herself. (Morrison, 1982: 119)
Once she feels alive is when she is with Nel. Nel was her best friend during childhood. They attached to each other as if an old friend. They shared dreams about men, opinions of things and the relationship is a relief for each other’s personality despite of their family condition. With Nel, every day is a new thing and it raises spirit in Sula to live out herself though her mother is not giving much attention. But it was changed after Nel’s marriage. Sula left Bottom and returned again in 10 years. Throughout her journey, she has many relationships with men but she cannot find the comfort she had with Nel in her love relationships. She missed the comfort, affection and appreciation. All of her men teach nothing but love tricks, share nothing but worries, give nothing but money and cannot be a friend Sula is trying to look for from them as she had with Nel. After all, her lovemaking is an escape for Sula from sadness of losing a friend. She is lonely because she does not have a friend like Nel to share dreams and understand her thoughts.
She went to bed as frequently as she could. It was the only place where she could find what she was looking for: misery and the ability to feel deep sorrow. (Morrison, 1982: 122)
about herself not others. She wants to do everything by herself without help from others. She does not need others to fulfill her needs or to help her. She does not see the importance of fulfilling her needs also so that she does not find a work or getting money. She is selfish person, thinks only about herself. Therefore, she refuses to have a family. She is enjoying living alone without thinking of a husband and children because it will limit her self expression. She does not want to be burdened by others. When it is uncommon things done by a woman, Sula insists to be on that way. She does not care of what people said about her and takes the risk being isolated from the society and lives alone without relatives or friend to take care of her, even until her death time.
“Well, don’t let your mouth start nothing that your ass can’t stand. When you gone to get married? You need to have some babies. It’ll settle you.” (Eva spoke)
“I don’t want to make somebody else. I want to make myself.”(Sula spoke)
“Selfish. Ain’t no woman got no business, floating around without no man.” (Morrison, 1982: 92)
“What are you talking about? I like my own dirt, Nellie. I’m not proud. You sure have forgotten me.”
“Maybe. Maybe not. But you a woman and you alone.” “And you? Ain’t you alone?”
“I’m not sick. I work.”
“Yes. Of course you do. Work’s good for you, Nellie. It don’t do nothing for me.”
“You neverhadto.” “I never would.”
“There’s something to say for it, Sula. Specially if you don’t want people to have to do for you.”
“Neither one, Nellie. Neither one.”
“You can’t have it all, Sula.“ Nel was getting exasperated with her arrogance, with her lying at death’s door still smart-talking.
“Why? I can do it all, why can’t I have it all?”
Though society consider Sula as pariah because her way of living, in fact, Sula is critical in what happened to women in her society. Through her conversation with Nel in her near death time, Sula is trying to explain how Nel, the same with other women, is suffering because of their family.
“You still going to know everything, ain’t you?”(Nel spoke)
“I don’t know everything, I just do everything.”(Sula spoke)
“Well, you don’t know what I do.”
“You think I don’t know what your life is like just because I ain’t living it? I know what every colored woman in this country is doing.”
“What’s that?”
“Dying. Just like me. But the difference is they dying like a stump. Me, I’m going down like one of those red-woods. I sure did live in this world.”
“Really? What have you got to show for it?”
“Show? To who? Girl, I got my mind. And what goes on it. Which is to say, I got me.”
“Lonely ain’t it?”
“Yes, but my lonely ismine. Now your lonely is somebody else’s. Made by somebody else and handed to you. Ain’t that something? A secondhand lonely.” (Morrison, 1982: 143)
Black, either men or women, suffer because of racism and being oppressed by White. However, Black women suffers more when Black men oppressed them who shares nothing but his oppressed feeling to his wife while she also faces another problems such as economic condition and children rearing, but she cannot share it to him because she doe not want to burden him. They are lonely because they repress their will, emotion and thoughts to meet her family’s needs. They do whatever needed to run their family well, on the contrary, their children and husband does not care about it. While this condition is unrealized by women in Bottom, Sula sees it clearly through their tiring faces, when she sees
Sula is different with women in her society. She is brave to do something different and uncommon that she believes as the best for her but the difference shown is not a proof of reaching something. Sula lives her days spiritless because she does not have goals to reach and the days she spent are for excitement and pleasure. She seeks no needs to achieve something and there are no exact reasons for her behavior. She does not improve anything of herself and gain nothing for improving her life.
2. The Characterization of Nel Wright
The first way to characterize Nel is her physical appearance description given by the author (Murphy, 1972: 161). Nel is a girl in the same age with Sula and they have similar family condition. Both of them does not have a father and only have a mother. Sula’s father died when she was only three years old while Nel’s father left her mother just before she was born. The author describes Nel as a wishbone thin girl, just like Sula, her skin color is as dark as wet sandpaper and she descends her father’s face, not her mother’s beauty since Nel’s grandmother is a Creole (Creole is someone descended from both Europeans and Africans).
Her daughter was more comfort and purpose than she ever hoped to find in this life. She rose grandly to the occasion of motherhood-grateful, deep down in her heart, that the child had not inherited the great beauty that was hers: that her skin had dusk in it, that her lashes were substantial but undignified in their length, that she had taken the broad flat nose of Wiley (although Helene expected to improve it somewhat) and his generous lips. (Morrison, 1982: 18)
170). Different with Hannah, Helene states strict roles on Nel to obey in order to guide Nel in suiting herself with the society, behaving gracefully with good manners so that she can be a well-mannered woman.
Under Helene’s hand the girl become obedient and polite. Any enthusiasms that little Nel showed are calmed by the mother until she drove her daughter’s imagination underground. (Morrison, 1982: 18)
Nel never does an awkward thing because it will not be accepted in the society. Under her mother guidance, she grew up as a girl who knows how to behave in every occasion and not react aggressively to a situation based on emotion like what Sula did when four boys try to harass them. When Sula slashed off her finger to intimidate them, Nel does not think it as a heroic act and a girl should not do such act like it because it is uncommon things to do in society. Nel knows how to gain prestige in society by not doing awkward attitudes.
The one she tried to protect Nel, she had cut off her own finger tip and earned not Nel’s gratitude but her disgust. (Morrison, 1982: 141)
Whether he was accurate in general, Ajax was right about Nel. Except for occasional leadership role with Sula, she had no aggression. Her parents had succeeded in rubbing down to a dull glow any sparkle or splutter she had. (Morrison, 1982: 83)
Though Nel is living on the dreadfully neatness and roles her mother had set, there is a moment in her childhood showing that she has unrealized power inside herself. This power is depicting her repressed emotion, feeling and imagination. It was when she had a trip by train with Helene to Sundown House, her great grandmother’s house to attend her great grandmother’s funeral. On the train, they entered a wrong car, which is a car for White, and with some embarrassment, they walked through it to the car for Black but a white conductor was stopping and insulting them for the mistake. At that moment, no one from black people there, especially the men, tried to help them, in fact, they contempt Helene and Nel’s foolishness. The occasion opens her mind of herself that she is a human and a girl who has to be respected. No one can underestimate her.
It was on the train, shuffling toward Cincinnati, that she resolved to be on guard-always. She wanted to make certain that no man ever looked at her that way. That no midnight eyes or marbled flesh would ever accost her and turn her into jelly. (Morrison, 1982: 22)
worthy. Over all, the trip changes her view of herself. For her, the trip represents freedom she missed. She feels that there is braveness, a power, joy and fear turn into one in her but she does not quite sure what it is.
“I’m me,” she whispered. “Me.”
Nel didn’t know what she meant, but on the other hand she knew exactly what she meant.
“I’m me. I’m not their daughter. I’m not Nel. I’m me. Me.”
Each time she said the wordmethere was a gathering in her like power, like joy, like fear. (Morrison, 1982: 28)
Nel is an expressive girl but repressed. The trip has encouraged her will to leave home one day, frees herself from Helene’s over power upon her. The me -ness she has realizes her to be free, powerful, brave, and confidential person. She is as confidential as herself who has a power to control her life, able and dare to make decisions and choices then she frees to plan her own future and not always being ruled by Helene or others. That is why she is always dreaming of leaving Medallion, the only way to explore herself. This me-ness also encourages her braveness to cultivate a friend with Sula though Helene prohibits it because Sula’s mother is sooty. With Sula, Nel suddenly forgets her goal to leave Medallion because their friendship already gives her enough space to express her repressed feeling.
For day afterward she imagined other trips she would take, alone though, to faraway place. Contemplating them was delicious. Leaving Medallion would be her goal. But that was before she met Sula, the girl she had seen for five years at Garfield Primary but never played with, never knew, because her mother said that Sula’s mother was sooty. The trip perhaps, or her new found me-ness, gave her strength to cultivate a friend in spite of her mother. (Morrison, 1982: 29)
each child. Sula and Nel’s friendship is a relief of their own family condition, Nel with her mother’s neatness and Sula with her mother’s ignorance. Together they adventure an exploration of everything that interested them, abandon the ways of other people and concentrate on their own perception of things. After she met Sula, she starts to break her mother’s roles.
When Mrs. Wright reminded Nel to pull her nose, she would do it enthusiastically but without the least hope in the world.
“While you sittin’ there, honey, go ‘head and pull your nose.” “It hurts, Mamma.”
“Don’t you want a nice nose when you grow up?”
After she met Sula, Nel slid the clothespin under the blanket as soon as she got in the bed. And although there was a still the hateful hot comb to suffer through each Saturday evening, its consequences-smooth hair-no longer interested her. (Morrison, 1982: 55)
It shows that theme-ness of Nel is getting clear for she becomes expressive in exploring things that interest her. When she is with Sula, she does what she wants, not what others want and does not think of good behaving or gaining pride in the society like what her mother wants her to. Nel feels that she has no obligation to please others, be what she does not want to be, or compete with others. In their friendship, Nel is free and independent in behaving without any involvement from her mother or Sula because Sula herself demands nothing from Nel. Their friendship let them to improve their personality each other.
Their meeting was fortunate, for it let them use each other to grow on. (Morrison, 1982: 52)
unconsciously, she lets herself to be controlled by others. If during her childhood, she was controlled by Helene, in her marriage, she is controlled by Jude and her children. According to Nel, she is happy with her marriage life, but when Sula sees her again after 10 years, she looks tired and burdened. She is spiritless with everything except her family, represses her expressions of emotions and loyal to her family very well to make her family happy. It was clearly shown when Sula takes a visit on her after Sula is returning from her 10 years journey. They have a comfort conversation like the old time, laugh together and it raises a soft warm feeling on Nel that she realized she never had it during her life with Jude.
Damp-faced, Nel stepped back into the kitchen. She felt new, soft and new. It had been the longest time since she had forgotten how deep and down it could be. So different the miscellaneous giggles and smiles she had learned to be content with these past few years. (Morrison, 1982: 98)
with Sula, it is as if her free and expressive feeling that had been repressed during her marriage suddenly appears. She is happy because she wants to be happy, not caused by others. After all, she is repressed by her family.
Pointing to Nel’s personality which is calm, mature, and able to behave in such situation, in fact, she is dependant on the other side, especially after she gets married. Nel thinks herself as a lucky woman to have a husband like Jude and does not need to improve anything in her besides giving the best to her family. She lets him controls her life so that when he left her for Sula, she feels empty and does not know what to do with her life and children for she had given up all her life to Jude and children. It is because she depends much on Jude as the bread winner of the family; and also because she depends on Jude’s love which she thinks as real so that she never thought of Jude will leave her.
It is not just with Jude on whom Nel is depended, but also with Sula. Sula is the one she thinks about when Jude left to help her cure her hurting feeling, even though it is Sula who becomes the woman Jude left Nel for. Sula can always cheer her up, make sure that everything would be fine, or just listen to her sadness. At the same time she thinks of Sula to calm her, she blames Sula for taking Jude and thinks that Sula betrays her. She is lonely person, losing a friend and lover in one moment.
Later on, in order to cope with her sadness and to continue her life and her children, she starts to find a work and focus all her strength to fulfill the needs. She is now become the leader of her life. She makes the choices and decisions for her and her children by her own without any involvement of influence from others and becomes independent on everything. She is an autonomous woman by condition. If Jude never leaves her, she would not know that she has a power over her life, not merely dependent and being ruled by others. However, she still blames Sula for Jude’s left. When she pays a visit for Sula in her near death, Nel arrogantly mocks Sula for being alone, without relatives or friends, until her last time. She is surprised when she knows that Sula bedded down with Jude for no reason, not even love, like what she did with other men.
“But…” Nel held her stomach in. “But what about me? What about me? Why didn’t you think about me? Didn’t I count? I never hurt you. What did you take him for if you didn’t love him and why didn’t you think about me?” And then, “I was good to you, Sula, why don’t that matter?”
done. Nel is someone who does everything on purpose. She does something for others because she wants others to do the same with hers to her.
Compared to Sula, as mentioned before, Nel is controllable, calm, and behave in right manners as what society thinks as good attitude of a woman. In fact, later after Sula’s death, she realizes that her calmness, maturity and controllable behavior show her selfishness upon Sula.
All these years she had been secretly proud of her calm, controlled behavior when Sula was uncontrollable, her compassion for Sula’s frightened and shamed eyes. Now it seemed that what she had thought was maturity, serenity and compassion was only the tranquility that follows a joyful stimulation. Just as the water closed peacefully over the turbulence of Chicken Little’s body, so had contentment washed over her enjoyment. (Morrison, 1982: 170)
When Chicken Little drowned, she does not feel afraid or guilty because she knows that Sula, who has a family with unusual condition and background and whose attitude are awkward such as when she cut off her finger tip to intimidate the boys, will be blamed by the society rather than her, who is behave in doing things. Sula panics when Chicken Little drowned, while Nel is very calm and tries to calm Sula. Though she seems more controllable in facing the condition, but she does not calm Sula down, but she calms herself that she is not going to be blame for it, but Sula will. Nel is selfish for letting Sula bear the guilty feeling by herself. She thinks only her needs and her dignity so that she does not share the guilty feeling together with Sula. After Sula’s death, she realizes her selfishness and fear to be responsible for what had happened.
What she thinks as her maturity, calmness and controllable behavior followed by gained prestige in society show her disability to over rule herself. Nel incorporates herself to what society expected shows that she looses he me-ness power that able to free and rule herself. She is unable to express her real feeling and let herself to be over ruled by others.
B. The Description of the Women Characters as Representative of ‘False
Self’
The second problem to be analyzed in this thesis is the description of both women characters, Sula and Nel, as representative of ‘false self’. The analysis does by applying the psychological theory of ‘false self’ to the both characterization.
‘False self’, according to D.W. Winnicott in Elliot’s book Psychoanalytic Theory (2002), is a person unable to establish stable emotional relations with others and this self along with ‘true self’, as its opposite, develops as a result of the quality of the mothering the child receives. If mother fails to understand and react to child’s spontaneous gestures of his or her needs, whereas she subjects the child to her own needs and the child tries desperately to make emotional relationship the mother by abandoning his or her own wishes and incorporating with the mother demands, feeling and desires.
the only daughter of a single parent, their personality develops differently along with how they were raised, relationship with others and how they place themselves in the society. Sula and Nel’s characteristics are affected by the way their mother raised them, or in other words, both of them is the product of their mother’s breed and for that reason these mother-daughter relationships become the first focus of the analysis on each character beside the fact that mother-daughter relationships is the first significant memory of life for each characters.
The application of ‘false self’ traits to the characters’ characteristics will be used to analyze the woman characters, Sula and Nel, as ‘false self’ even though not all the traits listed in chapter 2 can be applied to each character. The analysis will be divided into two parts, subtitled the description of Sula as representative of ‘false self’ and the description of Nel as representative of ‘false self’.
1. The Description of Sula Peace as Representative of ‘False Self’
Hannah, as described slightly in the previous discussion, does not provide supporting provisions for Sula as the only pattern Sula tries to imitate. In fact, Hannah put no demands upon Sula and set no limits to everything Sula does, therefore, Sula is difficult to distinguish her wishes and Hannah’s wishes. Her behavior imitates her mother and she has no clue whether what she did is true or false, right or wrong, bad or good etc. Unconsciously, she incorporates herself to what she saw on Hannah and resembles Hannah’s attitudes. She does what she wants to do.
Eva’s arrogance and Hannah’s self-indulgence merged in her and, with a twist that was all her own imagination, she lived out her days exploring her own thoughts and emotions, giving them full reign, feeling no obligation to please anybody unless their pleasure pleased her. (Morrison, 1982: 118) Therefore, she fails to make emotional relationship with others in society as well as she fails with her mother. Later when she returned home from 10 years journey, people consider her the same with evil especially after she sent out Eva from the house to Sunnydale, place for the old people. She does not gain respects from others because of her attitudes and everyone consider her as a bitch.
When the word got out about Eva being put in Sunnydale, the people in Bottom shook their heads and said Sula was a roach. Later, when they saw how she took Jude, then ditched him for others, and heard how he bought a ticket to Detroit (where he bought but never mailed birthday cards to his son), they forgot all about Hannah’s easy ways (or their own) and said she was a bitch. (Morrison, 1982: 112)
