Unveiling The Mystery Of Incest As The Mirror Of Soul Depression In “The God Of Small Things” And Its Relevance To The Modern Society (PBING-14)

CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background of the Study

Exultation can be reached through reading. This kind of activity is believed to be an effective way in avoiding listlessness. Many people love reading for looking for pleasure or just spending spare times. When reading foreign literature, the readers may also get supplementary knowledge about different culture. This activity can also stimulate people to learn English as well as to learn about themselves, people, lifestyle, and other societies.

Reading becomes my prominent activity for doing the analysis. As an English literature student I have read many literary works such as poetry, short story, novel, drama script, and so on. During my study, being deeply involved in literary works is considered to be one of the main tasks.

In a narrow sense, literature is defined as all things written; for example, text book, brochures, recipe, timetable, etc. In a broad sense, as stated in Encyclopedia Americana (1973:559), literature is ‘one of the great creative and universal means of communicating the emotional, spiritual, or intellectual concern of mankind’.

Hardjana (1985:10) in Kritik Sastra, Sebuah Pengantar states:

Sastra merupakan pengungkapan baku dari apa yang telah disaksikan orang dalam kehidupan, apa yang telah direnungkan, dan dirasakan orang mengenai segi-segi kehidupan yang paling menarik minat secara langsung lagi kuat pada hakikatnya adalah suatu pengungkapan kehidupan lewat bahasa.

Literature exists because it pleases us by imitating life or more precisely, by displaying the writer’s vision of life as it is or as the writers think it should be. Another function of literature is to expand or to refine our minds or quicken our sense of life (Koesnobroto, 1988).

As it is stated before, novel is one branch of literature. The theme about love, friendship, and life that are found in novels seems to be the outstanding points that attract the readers’ curiosity. The dictions used in novels are mostly denotative, containing little complexity and ambiguity. Therefore, novel is easier to read than poetry, play and other literary works. It is considered as a very crucial and enjoyable work to be analyzed

Talking about novel, I choose novel as the object of the study. In addition, I have read many novels during my study in English department. One of them is Arundhati Roy’s The God of Small Things. I am interested in its theme very much since it offers such magic, mystery, sadness, and love in explicit terms. It mostly tells about autobiographical story of an upper-caste family in Kerala, a part of India. Furthermore, the pictorial details of Kerala’s beauty and romanticism are also flowing freely through our senses. This novel also offers the exoticism, mysticism, and historical phenomenon in this city. Concerning those reasons, I will analyze The God of Small Things further in this paper.

In this project, I will unveil the topic about incest as found in the novel. This topic attracts me to analyze it further. Different opinions about this sexual relationship towards someone who is closely related has created a controversy that has not ended yet today. Many people think incest as a taboo phenomenon to be
raised. Kalibonso (2003) as quoted by Abdi (2003:109) states that ‘incest is always considered as a private family problem which the victim position is under pressured’. However, others claim that incest is a crime that the doer should be punished. The controversy has made incest one of interesting topics in novel. The author wrote about incest, committed by the characters, in a unique way. This phenomenon appeared differently compared to other sex deviation cases that finally enrich the incest itself. This is the main reason why I took incest as the focus of the analysis.

Furthermore, the result of this analysis is very crucial for me to compose the final project. As undergraduate (S1) student, I have to propose a final project in the end of my study. This final project is considered to be one of the requirements for getting the degree of Sarjana Sastra in English.