Metaphor As Reflected in The Main Character’s Expression in The Well-Beloved By Thomas Hardy: A Semiotic Approach

Oleh Alya Ulfa Elvandari

Abstract

Metaphor in literature commonly used in the novel is aimed to make the literary text more interesting and meaningful. In the nineteenth century, the literary work was supported by the debate of art and love, especially the novel The Well-Beloved by Thomas Hardy. The central concern of the novel is the Platonism that explained all beauty in a material form such as aesthetic work of art is an emanation from an Ideal form of Beauty (Abrams, 1981:157). Then, the debate makes the novelist could convey the art through the meaningful words later it called metaphor. The novel The Well-Beloved contains the metaphor expression especially used by the main character. Therefore, the purposes of this research are to explain the characterization of Jocelyn Pierston as the main character, to analyse the type and its meaning of Jocelyn Pierston’s metaphor expression, and to explain the moral value in the novel. The subject of this research is novel The Well-Beloved by Thomas Hardy and the object of this research is the main character’s metaphor expression and its meaning in the novel. Furthermore, the type of this research is descriptive qualitative research. Meanwhile, techniques of analysing data of this research is descriptive interpretive method. The research finding of this research are: First, the characterization of Jocelyn Pierston are philosophic, obsessive, responsible, clever, fickle, romantic, stubborn, reckless, straightforward, caring, and patient, Second, there are four kinds of metaphor expression by Jocelyn Pierston, they are: a kimberlin, a candid young person, an elf, and a sprite, a sylph, a Psyche. Moreover, the type of metaphor expression is man metaphor.

Key Words: Metaphor expression; semiotic approach; The Well-Beloved