MISS EMILY’S UNFULFILLMENT OF LOVE IN WILLIAM FAULKNER’S A ROSE FOR EMILY

Abstract

A Rose for Emily is a short story written by William Faulkner. The short story is partly based on the author’s experience. Mostly, this short story tells about Miss Emily as the main character who can not fulfill her love. The purposes of writing this thesis are, first, to give clear information about the meaning of love according to Miss Emily, second is the effect of unfulfillment of love by the main character that makes her do the abnormal behavior, and the last is the relation between the author as the creator of literary work and his work A Rose for Emily. In addition, this thesis applies the theory of Motivation and Personality by Abraham H. Maslow and theory of Eros and Thanatos by Sigmund Freud. This thesis applies the pyramid of Hierarchy of needs in the theory of motivation and personality by Abraham H. Maslow, begins with physiological needs, safety needs, belongingness and love needs, self-esteem needs, and ended by self- actualization needs. Besides, the theory of Eros and Thanatos by Sigmund Freud is used as the supporting theory. The method used in this thesis is documentary method, that is a method in collecting data by using written materials as a basis for the research. It can be very useful techniques for collecting data in which the records of the previous research and the material are considered as the source of particular topic. The analysis begins with the meaning of love according to Miss Emily in her life, continued with the effect of the unfulfillment of love until she kills Baron and keeps the corpse with her for a lifetime and it has the relation between the author’s life and his work. As known that the psychology of literature is the study about the authors’s life who puts his idea, experience, and creativity into a literary work. The general conclusion is Miss Emily as a common woman who needs love in her life and decides to kill Baron and keeps his corpse for lifetime to prove that she is able to have a partner in her life, eventhough in an unusual way.