Philanthropism In Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol:A Genetic Structuralism Analysis

Abstract

A Christmas Carol is a novella written by Charles Dickens. This novella tells about the life of old miser namely Ebenezer Scrooge who gets a spiritual journey on Christmas Eve. The spiritual journey Scrooge gets from the Ghost of Christmas Past, The Ghost of Christmas Present and The Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come succeeds to change Scrooge‘s attitude from bad into good. He becomes the one who loves Christmas and becomes the one who is hospitable. This thesis is conducted to analyze the world view of Charles Dickens in A Christmas Carol, a novella where a Philanthropism discourse is found. Philanthropism is assumed as the ideology that Dickens inserted through his work in order to change the moral decadence when Industrial Revolution happened during Victorian Era. There are four questions in this research; those are the significant structure of the novella, the social structure in England as the contextual background of the novella, the world view of the author which is expressed through the novella and the class position of the author. In addition, this research has five purposes. The first is to inform the reader about the significant structure of the novella. Second, is to make the readers know about the social structures in England as the contextual background of the novella that makes the author create A Christmas Carol. Third, is to describe how the world view of the author which is expressed through the novella and the fourth is to know the class position of the author. The last is hoped to give contribution for the institution as the result during teaching-studying process of learning English literature. It is aimed to help the readers to enrich their knowledge dealing with literary analysis and hopefully the result of the research can be used and developed by other researchers. In doing the research, qualitative research method is used. The qualitative method means that the analysis deals with non numerical data. The data which will be analyzed are the data which are taken from books, journals, internet sources etc. The primary data that will be used is taken from the quotations from the novella entitled A Christmas Carol which show the philanthropism discourse. While the secondary data are taken from relevant books, internet sources and journals. The discussion is started with the analysis of the structure of the text that is the setting of place and the sharacterization of the characters and then connect it to the context that are the condition of England and the life of the author in order to look for the world view. In analyzing the world view, Genetic Structuralism is used. It is a theory that analyzes the intrinsic and the extrinsic elements of literary work. After analyzing the data by using Genetic Structuralism theory by Lucien Goldmann, it can be concluded that there is a philanthropism discourse in the novella which was written by Charles Dickens. The idea of philanthropism is showed by the main character‘s changing attitude from stingy to generous. The idea of philanthropism is also showed by other characters opinions and acts. The influences that made Charles Dickens writes his first novella came from his religion, humiliating childhood and the miserable life of the poor. The idea of Charles Dickens as a middle class man was to urge his wanting and his criticism towards his social environment. His idea was used as a bridge to link the rich and the poor. By giving and loving each other, we reduce the tension and the gap between those two classes. Thus, philanthropism is a must in order to bring back the warmth of our heart and to keep the love in our heart.