POSDNICHEFF’S PERSONALITY DEVELOPMENT IN LEO TOLSTOY’S THE KREUTZER SONATA

Abstract

The Kreutzer Sonata is one of Tolstoy’s novels. It is published in 1889. Mostly, this novel tells about Posdnicheff as the main character of this novel. Posdnicheff is identified as an innocent boy when he is young. Further, he meets a girl and falls in love with her. After marrying, he is known as a kind person. Unfortunately, this condition changes when he gets some problems in his marriage. His marriage is full of jealousy. Later, he experiences a bad condition that makes his personality change. In this case, he cannot control his emotion and in the end of the story he kills his wife cruelly. The goal of this thesis is to give a clear description about the causes and the process of the main character’s personality development. There are some causes supporting his personality development. Firstly, his personality is influenced by the family background that creates him as an innocent boy. Unfortunately, he changes his personality into a bad one. Secondly, his personality is a kind person. Because of his kindness, his wife’s behaviour change. It is proven by his wife’s behaviour which has an affair with the musician. Posdnicheff’s wife betrays his faith. He is angry towards his wife’s affair. The last cause is his jealousy toward his wife and the musician. His jealousy makes him unable to control his behaviour. He releases his anger cruelly towards his wife. In addition, this thesis uses psychological approach to analyze the fictitious character. The theory of personality is used in this thesis. The theory is created by Sigmund Freud. The theory explains about personality structure; they are id, ego, and superego. Id is irrational, ego is rational and superego is a society rule about right and wrong. Furthermore, the method is used to analyze data is inductive method. It means that the discussion of the thesis goes from particular ideas to general conclusion. In applying this method, the analysis begins a study on Posdnicheff’s personality and behaviour. He changes from an innocent and a kind person to a bad one. He cannot control his feeling and jealousy. He kills his wife. Then, the general conclusion drawn is that Posdnicheff experiences his personality development. He becomes a cruel person and a murderer.