Literary work
Aliterary work has its roots in one of the most basic human desires, the desires for pleasure (Landy, 2000:3). Thus, literary work takes place on human being as human’s wants of satisfaction. According to Landy (2000:3) literature is exist to complete human’s wants of satisfaction through its works that formed into story by presenting sight of life as it is or as the writers think it should be. The purpose of reading literature is not always just for enhance pleasures but also for seeing, feeling, and well understanding the life, human beings, and nature. By reading and understanding the literary works, people can increase their knowledge and take many benefits from them.
Literary work divided into three parts: prose, poetry, and drama. Prose consists of several kinds of literary works such as short story, romance, and novel (Subhan, 2012:1). Novel is one of literary genre which usually analyzed by many researchers for doing such kind of literary research or thesis. Sometimes novel can tell the readers about human being’s life story, but sometimes it also represent human’s culture. The researcher can analyze the language of the novel, the culture of the novel, and even the characters of the novel.
Thisarticle discusses a culture comparison in two novels from different authors. They are Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice(1813)andMarahRusli’sSittiNurbaya(1922). They were published in adjacent era. The authors are British and Indonesian, yet they have similar problem to face on and different culture points of view to solve the problem.
Both novels have their own special reason why they were famous in their era until recently. Pride and Prejudice were famous because it appeared in the early 18th century of feminism. The romance story itself shows of a situation where women are firmly in charge just as described by the author, Jane Austen. It tells about the Bennets whose daughter are five. The daughters are ready to have a serious relationship to the man who they like. But marriage becomes an economical problem solving rather than a social activity. It means that one of them (the man or the woman who marry) want a mate who can help their household economy. Marriage is not upon an emotional feeling anymore.
Similar theme is brought byMarahRusli’sSittiNurbaya, which is first published around the 19th century. The main character is always live in pain since her mother passed away. Not only her wrecked love, but she also must face the reality that she has to marry an old fart who is very cruel to every villagers especially her father who live in the village. She has to be the payment of her father’s debts to the old fart to save her father life. She agreed the agreement even though she lives in a painful life.
This article will discussthe similarities and dissimilarities of both novels’ culture as the comparative study. By knowing both novels’ similarities and dissimilarities, we will know the culture that is reflected on both novels. We will know and understand how the west culture and the east culture views about a problem then, and what moral value that we can infer from the discussion.
Discussion
- Culture
Sujarwa (2011:31) said that the principles of culture are acknowledging the existence of human creation, including the behavior and the results of human’s behavior, which is regulated by a code of conduct and is obtained by learning, which all of them are made up in people’s lives. Meanwhile, the culture in the society is often interpreted as the general body of the art, which is covered literature, music, sculpture, art, philosophy of knowledge, or the beautiful parts of